profitable
Americanadjective
-
yielding profit; remunerative.
a profitable deal.
-
beneficial or useful.
- Synonyms:
- helpful, valuable, advantageous
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of profitable
Explanation
Things that are profitable make money or are beneficial in other ways. Businesses hope to be profitable in the financial sense, but a profitable relationship is one that's good for everyone involved. Profitable started out as a word to describe anything useful, but it hooked up with finance in the mid-1700s. Profits are measured in money earned beyond expenses, so profitable businesses or transactions make money. A busy restaurant, sold-out concert, and best-selling book are all profitable. People also use this word for situations that are good in ways that don’t involve money. If you learned a lot from something, then it was a profitable experience, even if you didn't make any cash.
Vocabulary lists containing profitable
Content Summary 4.1: Causes and Consequences of Iberian Maritime Exploration and Colonialism
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From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
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Business, List 3
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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.
Chip companies focusing their efforts on profitable HBM has also fuelled shortages of the less glamorous computer memory components used in everyday consumer electronics -- driving up the price of smartphones and laptops.
From Barron's ● Oct. 29, 2026
A wind-down would mark an extraordinary fall for a firm with some 1,200 lawyers worldwide that had been among the most well-regarded and profitable in the industry.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 28, 2026
JetBlue shares rallied on Tuesday after the beleaguered airline sought to allay worries about its business, saying it’s on the cusp of being profitable again — something it hasn’t managed to accomplish since 2019.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 27, 2026
The company’s only profitable business segment this year has been its space-based Wi-Fi service Starlink, which recorded $5.2 billion in operating profit on $12.8 billion in revenue in the first nine months of this year.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 27, 2026
“But on the whole a profitable morning’s shopping. You ready to trade in the stuff?”
From "The Dead and the Gone" by Susan Beth Pfeffer
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
