break even

🌎Region: International 📊Difficulty Level:intermediate

💡Meaning

To have no profit and no loss; to earn exactly enough to cover costs.

🕰️Origin

From accounting and business language: “break” meaning to reach/achieve a point, and “even” meaning equal. It describes reaching the point where costs and revenue are equal.

📝Notes

Often used in business/finance. Can sound modest or slightly disappointed (no profit), or relieved (no loss). Neutral, common in both speech and writing.

💬Examples

We only need 200 more ticket sales to break even.
After months of losses, the cafe finally broke even.
If we can break even this quarter, I’ll consider it a win.
The company expects to break even on the project by next year.
With shipping costs so high, I’m barely breaking even on online orders.

📘Grammar & Usage Notes

Verb phrase, usually intransitive: break even (no object). Inflects normally: breaks/broke/breaking even. Often followed by on + amount/item (break even on the deal).

🔗Synonyms

cover costs
neither profit nor loss
come out even
be in the black and the red neither

↔️Antonyms

make a profit
turn a profit
run at a loss