Meaning of earn In English

• 0 to receive money as payment for work that you do:

  • I earn $80,000 a year.

  • How much do you earn, if you don't mind me asking?

  • You can't expect to earn a living (= be paid enough money to live on) from your painting.

  • [ + two objects ] Coffee exports earn (= give) Brazil many millions of dollars a year./Brazil earns many millions of dollars a year from coffee exports.

  • It's been a tough six months and I feel I've earned a few weeks off.

• 1 to receive money as payment for work that you do, or to get something that you deserve because of your abilities or actions:

  • [ T ] This month’s raise means that I’ll be earning $45,000 a year.

  • [ T ] After all the work I’ve done, I’ve earned a vacation.

• 2 to receive money as payment for work that you do:

  • How much do you earn?

  • When I started earning, I decided to open a savings account.

  • earn a salary/a wage/an income A typical manager will earn a salary of at least $69,000.

  • Brokers earn commission on each sale.

  • earn sb sth She turned down an advert that would have earned her £1 million.

• 3 to make a particular amount of money from a product or business activity:

  • His last three films have earned more than $437 million worldwide.

  • In 1994, BBA earned pretax profit of 84.3 million pounds.

  • earn sth from sth The region earns billions of dollars from tourism.

• 4 to get an amount of money as profit or interest on an investment or loan:

  • You can buy and sell these unit trusts when you choose, and you earn dividends.

  • Any spare cash is best put in a savings account where it will earn interest.

  • Local governments use the fund as a money-market account to earn interest on surplus cash.

• 5 to collect a reward for doing business with a particular company or for a particular activity. You can use these rewards to buy goods or get some other advantage:

  • Apply now to start earning loyalty points

  • Organizations can earn carbon credits by registering an energy saving project.

• 6 to be paid the money that you need to live on:

  • He earns a living as a self-employed consultant.