overcharge
Americanverb (used with object)
-
overcharges,
present (3rd person singular)
-
overcharged,
past participle, past
-
overcharging
present participle
-
to charge (a purchaser) too high a price.
When the manager realized we'd been overcharged, she gave us a credit for the difference.
-
to fill too full; overload.
-
to exaggerate.
to overcharge the importance of ancestry.
verb (used without object)
-
overcharges,
present (3rd person singular)
-
overcharged,
past participle, past
-
overcharging
present participle
noun
-
a charge in excess of a stated or just price.
-
an act of overcharging.
-
an excessive load.
verb
-
to charge too much
-
(tr) to fill or load beyond capacity
-
literary another word for exaggerate
noun
-
an excessive price or charge
-
an excessive load
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
overchargesimple
-
overchargessimple
-
have overchargedperfect
-
has overchargedperfect
-
am overchargingprogressive
-
are overchargingprogressive
-
is overchargingprogressive
-
have been overchargingperfect progressive
-
has been overchargingperfect progressive
Past
-
overchargedsimple
-
had overchargedperfect
-
was overchargingprogressive
-
were overchargingprogressive
-
had been overchargingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of overcharge
Middle English word dating back to 1275–1325; see origin at over-, charge
Explanation
If a shopkeeper overcharges you, they ask you to pay too much for something. To overcharge isn't very honest, but it's not usually illegal either. Sometimes it's obvious that someone is trying to overcharge you: if the taxi driver announces that you owe her a hundred dollars after driving a route that usually costs about twenty, you can call that a blatant overcharge. In other cases, you may not realize until much later. It's not uncommon for salespeople to overcharge tourists, for example, making them pay too much money because they don't know any better.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
“It is reprehensible to overcharge and take advantage of wildfire victims who were in desperate need of housing as they fled their homes from raging fires last year,” Los Angeles County Dist.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 13, 2026
Lawyers for the plaintiffs estimated that the lack of competition in the repair market allowed dealers to overcharge by $190 million to $387 million.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 19, 2026
In practice, many insurers overcharge the federal government hundreds of billions of dollars in inflated estimates, often by adding diagnosis codes that make individuals appear sicker on paper than they are in reality.
From Salon ● Sep. 3, 2024
Due to this capture, Google is able to overcharge text-ad clients and shroud its actual terms in secrecy in a way that it hasn’t with more visually oriented ads.
From Slate ● Aug. 6, 2024
If the battery is charged daily, it should receive an overcharge once a week, or if charged less frequently, an overcharge should be given at least once every two weeks.
From Cyclopedia of Telephony and Telegraphy, Vol. 2 A General Reference Work on Telephony, etc. etc. by Samuel McMeen
And earlier this year, a jury found that Live Nation was an illegal monopoly, following years of criticism that the company stifles competition and overcharges fans, but analysts say a breakup is unlikely.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 2, 2026
“The companies pulled their punches, and one company was left being the sole bidder on the contract and that involved a lot of overcharges to the good people of Texas,” Slater said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 4, 2025
Tap again when leaving a station to avoid overcharges.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 26, 2024
Bradshaw is suing Clark and more than a dozen other attorneys over their handling of a separate lawsuit stemming from DWP billing overcharges, alleging his due processes were violated.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 5, 2024
Some overcharges had been taken off and some bad money in change to be replaced by honest coin, and it was evident that various little well-intended rogueries had not achieved their usual success.
From A Day's Ride A Life's Romance by Charles James Lever
Government watchdogs have alleged that some defense contractors have overcharged the military for products and parts, and Republican and Democratic lawmakers have called for stricter oversight.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 15, 2026
If it did pay dividends on watered stock, the public assumed it was being overcharged.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 12, 2026
The base fee also protects the customer, in theory, from being overcharged.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 10, 2026
Kim Kardashian’s fashion brand must pay $200,000 to settle allegations that it overcharged customers over a five-year period.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 22, 2026
They were certain the bill overcharged them by twenty-two dollars.
From "Warriors Don't Cry: A Searing Memoir of the Battle to Integrate Little Rock's Central High" by Melba Pattillo Beals
I believe this is a legitimate case of timeshare overcharging.
From MarketWatch ● Apr. 27, 2026
Live Nation, the entertainment giant which owns Ticketmaster, has been illegally operating as a monopoly and overcharging fans, a federal jury has found.
From BBC ● Apr. 15, 2026
A group of states accused the company of overcharging music fans and pressuring venues to use its dominant ticketing service, Ticketmaster.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 15, 2026
In 2012, Walmart agreed to pay $2.1 million for allegedly overcharging customers in California and failing to comply with a 2008 judgment that required the company to resolve errors in pricing at checkout stands.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 8, 2025
The prosecutor is also free to file more charges against a defendant than can realistically be proven in court, so long as probable cause arguably exists—a practice known as overcharging.
From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
