reward
Americannoun
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rewards
plural
verb (used with object)
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rewards,
present (3rd person singular)
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rewarded,
past participle, past
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rewarding
present participle
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to recompense or requite (a person or animal) for service, merit, achievement, etc.
- Synonyms:
- remunerate, pay, compensate
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to make return for or requite (service, merit, etc.); recompense.
noun
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something given or received in return for a deed or service rendered
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a sum of money offered, esp for help in finding a criminal or for the return of lost or stolen property
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profit or return
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something received in return for good or evil; deserts
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psychol any pleasant event that follows a response and therefore increases the likelihood of the response recurring in the future
verb
Synonym Usage
Reward, prize, recompense imply something given in return for good. A reward is something given or done in return for good (or, more rarely, evil) received; it may refer to something abstract or concrete: a $50 reward; Virtue is its own reward. Prize refers to something concrete offered as a reward of merit, or to be contested for and given to the winner: to win a prize for an essay. A recompense is something given or done, whether as reward or punishment, for acts performed, services rendered, etc.; or it may be something given in compensation for loss or injury suffered, etc.: Renown was his principal recompense for years of hard work.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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rewardablenessnoun
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rewardernoun
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overrewardverb
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misrewardverb (used with object)
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superrewardverb (used with object)
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rewardableadjective
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rewardlessadjective
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unrewardableadjective
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unrewardedadjective
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well-rewardedadjective
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rewardablyadverb
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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rewardsimple
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rewardssimple
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have rewardedperfect
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has rewardedperfect
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am rewardingprogressive
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are rewardingprogressive
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is rewardingprogressive
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have been rewardingperfect progressive
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has been rewardingperfect progressive
Past
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rewardedsimple
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had rewardedperfect
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was rewardingprogressive
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were rewardingprogressive
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had been rewardingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of reward
First recorded in 1275–1325; Middle English (verb) rewarden originally, “to regard,” from Old North French rewarder “to look at,” variant of Old French reguarder; see origin at regard
Explanation
A reward is something you get for a job well done. If you study hard for that vocabulary test, an "A" might be the reward in your future. You can use reward as a verb, as when the mayor rewards a firefighter who saves a family from a terrible blaze, or as a noun, to talk about the actual payment or item that's given to the firefighter. People often offer a reward for the return of lost or stolen things, like bicycles or jewelry or dogs. Reward meant "a regarding" or "an observation" in the 1300's, but it soon came to mean "repayment for some service."
Vocabulary lists containing reward
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:
These packages, which often run into thousands of dollars, attract many celebrities and corporate buyers who see the Games as a chance to butter up clients or reward top performers.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2026
The central question is whether a reward is “economically or functionally equivalent” to interest on a bank deposit, a test the bill never defines.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026
Critically, the lateral septum shares this information with the dopamine-producing regions we would normally associate with reward.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 12, 2026
Weary of venomous snake bites, British authorities put a bounty on dead cobras — but this only incentivized locals to breed more of the snakes, in order to collect even more reward money.
From Salon ● Aug. 12, 2026
“Oh! my darling! God bless you and reward you!”
From "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë
Mabe believes that overall, for gardeners embracing long-lasting electric equipment, "There's big rewards if they can make it work."
From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026
Idaho has no dedicated water cybersecurity mandate, but created a fund that rewards projects that build in “cyber-informed design principles” from the start.
From Slate ● Aug. 19, 2026
The crew’s performance on the ride can translate into in-game rewards if riders’ accounts are linked.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 17, 2026
Stablecoins can’t offer fraud protection or access to credit and rewards of credit cards, and Mastercard and Visa are now offering stablecoin-linked programs.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 13, 2026
He seems listless and confused, and though he still learns new problems without external rewards, his performance is peculiar.
From "Flowers for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes
Stocks have historically rewarded investors who stay invested for the long term.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 11, 2026
In a world free of geopolitics, "the Manus story would be a simple story of an incredible AI startup getting rewarded with a big exit", Kyle Chan from the Brookings Institution told AFP.
From Barron's ● Aug. 11, 2026
Violence should be punished, not rewarded, and attention should only be given for positive behavior.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026
A few months later, the academy graduate was rewarded with a new five-year contract.
From BBC ● Aug. 7, 2026
As for report cards, members of the family who brought home good grades were feted and rewarded.
From "Cheaper by the Dozen" by Frank B. Gilbreth Jr. and Ernestine Gilbreth Carey
Not every bet will pay off, but investors are increasingly rewarding the dealmaking.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 19, 2026
Atlassian, Twilio, JFrog, and Cloudflare surge after earnings, fueling hopes that software investors are rewarding fundamentals again.
From Barron's ● Aug. 8, 2026
Moving the rock through finer and finer grits is time-consuming, strenuous and not always rewarding.
From Salon ● Aug. 6, 2026
“I got the sense that there was a culture that wasn’t rewarding performance. It was rewarding just showing up,” said Seigerman, the BMO Capital analyst.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 5, 2026
Jessie did not come around anymore, she was fishing the rewarding waters of the open stream, she was returning to a tree hollow full of babies.
From "My Side of the Mountain" by Jean Craighead George
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.
