Synonyms

shell out

British

verb

informal (adverb) to pay out or hand over (money)

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

shell out Idioms

Pay, hand over, as in We had to shell out $1,000 for auto repairs. This expression transfers taking a seed such as a pea or nut out of its pod or shell to taking money out of one's pocket. [Colloquial; c. 1800]

Etymology

Origin of shell out

C19: from _shell (in the sense: to remove from a pod or (figuratively) a purse)

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:

shell out

Still, most of us aren’t expected to shell out thousands to go to a get-together we know we’ll hate.

From Salon ● Sep. 9, 2026

“Now it’s a bet to get users to shell out $2,200 a piece.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 2, 2026

But the Dodgers are the greatest show in baseball, playing before stadiums packed with fans willing to shell out top dollar to see a roster that includes international superstars Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2026

Unable to shell out the additional fees, Ko Myint dropped out of the programme despite having been offered a place to study nursing in Helsinki.

From BBC ● Jun. 12, 2026

But before we could shell out the four hundred dollars for classes at A.C.T.

From "Americanized" by Sara Saedi

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023