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• ore
  ore

  noun

  a metal-bearing mineral or rock, or a native metal, that can be mined at a profit.
• öre
  öre

  noun

  a bronze coin of Norway, one 100th of a krone.
• Ore.
  Ore.

  abbreviation

  Oregon.

ore

¹ American  

[awr, ohr] / ɔr, oʊr /

noun

• ores
  plural

1. a metal-bearing mineral or rock, or a native metal, that can be mined at a profit.

2. a mineral or natural product serving as a source of some nonmetallic substance, as sulfur.

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öre ² American  

[œ-ruh] / ˈœ rə /

Also øre

noun

• öre
  plural

1. a bronze coin of Norway, one 100th of a krone.

2. a zinc or bronze coin of Denmark, one 100th of a krone.

3. a bronze coin of Sweden, one 100th of a krona.

4. a fractional currency of the Faeroe Islands, one 100th of a krona.

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Ore. ³ American  

abbreviation

1. Oregon.

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öre ¹ British  

/ ˈørə /

noun

1. a Scandinavian monetary unit worth one hundredth of a Swedish krona and ( øre ) one hundredth of a Danish and Norwegian krone

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ore ² British  

/ ɔː /

noun

1. any naturally occurring mineral or aggregate of minerals from which economically important constituents, esp metals, can be extracted

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ore Scientific  

/ ôr /

1. A naturally occurring mineral or rock from which a valuable or useful substance, especially a metal, can be extracted at a reasonable cost.

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ore Cultural  

1. In geology, a mineral that contains a commercially useful material, such as gold or uranium.

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Discover More

Ore deposits are generally mined, and the ore is processed to recover the material.

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• ores
  plural
• öre
  plural

Etymology

Origin of ore¹

before 900; conflation of Middle English ore, Old English ōra ore, unreduced metal; and Middle English or(e) ore, metal, Old English ār brass, cognate with Old Saxon, Old High German ēr, Old Norse eir, Gothic aiz; compare Latin aes bronze, coin, money

Origin of öre²

First recorded in 1600–10; ultimately from Latin aureus “a gold coin of ancient Rome”; see aureus ( def. )

Explanation

Ore is a rock that contains minerals like iron, gold, or lead. The seven dwarfs in the movie "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" worked mining ore. Another meaning of ore is a Swedish unit of money. The krona is made up of 100 ore. In this use, ore is usually spelled with an umlaut over the o — öre. In English, ore is most commonly used to mean a material from which valuable metals or gems can be extracted. In Old English, ora means unwrought metal and ar means bronze. Both root words are thought to have influenced this sense of ore.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

ore öre Ore. ores

The research focuses on magnetite, a mineral that is abundant in Western Australia's huge iron ore deposits across the Pilbara region.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 29, 2026

Chile, the world’s top copper producer, is lowering output due to aging mines and declining ore grades, and opening a new copper mine takes anywhere between 10 to 15 years to develop.

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 27, 2026

The metal has eclipsed iron ore as the biggest earner for BHP -- generating more than half of the group's operating profit for the first time.

From Barron's ● Aug. 18, 2026

Because the gold won’t be processed at the mine, large amounts of ore would need to be brought through the park and shipped out on barges.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026

Holmes’s building and land were valuable to begin with, given Englewood’s continued growth, but now his property seemed the equivalent of a seam of gold ore.

From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson

The tax is called a skatt-öre, the word originating from the small coin of that name, and each town decides whether the öre shall be charged on two hundred or four hundred marks.

From Through Finland in Carts by Mrs. (Ethel) Alec-Tweedie

The government has adopted a decimal system, of which the unit is the riksdaler, containing one hundred öre.

From Up The Baltic Young America in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark by Oliver Optic

The öre coin has no distinct head or tail, so the Skipper named one side heads, and tossed.

From Three in Norway by Two of Them by Walter J. Clutterbuck

The anxious countryman had got quit of his candle and received his sixty-three öre, and the commercial gentlemen had set to work upon the roast hare.

From Norse Tales and Sketches by Alexander Lange Kielland

It is noticeable also that those stamped 1523, which were presumably issued for an öre, contain a trifle more in value than those stamped 1522, and called an öre and a half.

From The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa by Paul Barron Watson

Cheers to the Eugene, Ore., airport for offering a free short story dispenser in conjunction with the Eugene Public Library.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 28, 2026

Daejon Labrayae Love, 35, and Taylor Jamie Chan, 18, have been charged in federal court in Portland, Ore., with wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 27, 2026

Portland, Ore.: By preventing the stripping of fasteners, Henry Phillips’s design enabled the use of high-speed power tools essential for World War II-era assembly lines.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 9, 2026

The driver was a 21-year-old man from Yuba City, and the two passengers were a 17-year-old boy from San José and a 27-year-old man from Salem, Ore. All three died in the crash.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 24, 2026

Sarah A, see Ore. chapter, 538, 541, 545.Ewing,

From The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI by Ida Husted Harper

Metal ores dug up during mining often contain sulfide minerals.

From Barron's ● Jul. 22, 2026

Africa's exports to China are dominated by minerals and raw materials, such as crude oil and metallic ores.

From BBC ● Apr. 30, 2026

On a year-over-year basis, the increase was led by gold, silver and platinum-group metal ores, followed by conventional and synthetic crude oil, and cattle and calves.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 23, 2026

“They are very complex ores with highly unusual mineralogy, and some of them have relatively high contents of the radioactive elements uranium and thorium,” Goodenough notes.

From Barron's ● Jan. 7, 2026

“We can be our own barbarians. Madame Szegeczowska.—Oh, I meant to ask you. The Almaden mercury mines have fallen off quite badly in production. Surely the ores are not declining more rapidly than anticipated?”

From "I, Robot" by Isaac Asimov

Related Words

• gold
• iron
• metal
• mineral
• platinum