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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

penny.

In the United Kingdom and Ireland and many other countries, a unit of currency worth ¹⁄₂₄₀ of a pound sterling or Irish pound before decimalisation, or a copper coin worth this amount. Abbreviation: d.

5 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈpɛni/General-American, Received-Pronunciation/ˈpɪni/US, pin-pen-merger/ˈpeni/Australia, New-Zealand[ˈpeni] ~ [ˈpe̞ni]Australia
  1. In the United Kingdom and Ireland and many other countries, a unit of currency worth ¹⁄₂₄₀ of a pound sterling or Irish pound before decimalisation, or a copper coin worth this amount. Abbreviation: d.

    historical
  2. In the United Kingdom, a unit of currency worth ¹⁄₁₀₀ of a pound sterling, or a copper coin worth this amount. Abbreviation: p.

  3. In Ireland, a coin worth ¹⁄₁₀₀ of an Irish pound before the introduction of the euro. Abbreviation: p.

    historical
  4. In the US and (formerly) Canada, a one-cent coin, worth ¹⁄₁₀₀ of a dollar. Abbreviation: ¢.

  5. In various countries, a small-denomination copper or brass coin.

  6. A unit of nail size, said to be either the cost per 100 nails, or the number of nails per penny. Abbreviation: d.

  7. Money in general.

    to turn an honest penny
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Pre-Greekder.? Ancient Greek πᾰτᾰ́νη (pătắnē)bor. Latin patina Latin panna? Latin pannus? Proto-Indo-European *-n̥kʷo-der.? Proto-Indo-European *-nós Proto-Indo-European *-iHnos Proto-Germanic *-īnaz Proto-Indo-European *-kos Proto-Germanic *-gaz ? Proto-Germanic *-ingaz Proto-Germanic *panningaz Proto-West Germanic *panning Old English peniġ Middle English peny English penny From Middle English peny, from Old English peniġ, penniġ, penning (“penny”), from Proto-West Germanic *panning, from Proto-Germanic *panningaz, of uncertain origin (see that page for theories). Doublet of pfennig and fening.

verb/ˈpɛni/General-American, Received-Pronunciation/ˈpɪni/US, pin-pen-merger/ˈpeni/Australia, New-Zealand[ˈpeni] ~ [ˈpe̞ni]Australia
  1. To jam a door shut by inserting pennies between the doorframe and the door.

    slang
    Zach and Ben had only been at college for a week when their door was pennied by the girls down the hall.
  2. To circumvent the tripping of an electrical circuit breaker by the dangerous practice of inserting a coin in place of a fuse in a fuse socket.

  3. During a meal or as part of a drinking game, to drop a penny in a person's drink with the expectation that they finish it (or some such variation thereof); commonly associated with crewdates at Oxford and swaps at Cambridge.

    You got pennied! Down it, fresher.
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Pre-Greekder.? Ancient Greek πᾰτᾰ́νη (pătắnē)bor. Latin patina Latin panna? Latin pannus? Proto-Indo-European *-n̥kʷo-der.? Proto-Indo-European *-nós Proto-Indo-European *-iHnos Proto-Germanic *-īnaz Proto-Indo-European *-kos Proto-Germanic *-gaz ? Proto-Germanic *-ingaz Proto-Germanic *panningaz Proto-West Germanic *panning Old English peniġ Middle English peny English penny From Middle English peny, from Old English peniġ, penniġ, penning (“penny”), from Proto-West Germanic *panning, from Proto-Germanic *panningaz, of uncertain origin (see that page for theories). Doublet of pfennig and fening.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.