lucrative
- 01 B2 Upper Intermediate
producing a lot of money or profit.
producing a great deal of profit or wealth; highly remunerative.
Simple“She left her teaching job to start a lucrative career in software design.”
In context“The investment firm identified several lucrative opportunities in emerging markets that had been overlooked by their competitors.”
UsageOften used to describe careers, contracts, deals, or markets.
SynonymsAntonymsunprofitableloss making - 02 C1 Advanced
describes a target that is very important or useful to destroy in a war.
referring to a target whose destruction provides a significant tactical or strategic advantage.
Simple“The enemy's supply bridge was a lucrative target for the air force.”
In context“Intelligence reports suggested that the fuel depot was a lucrative target, as its destruction would immobilise the entire regional transport network.”
Teacher's tipIn this military sense, 'lucrative' does not mean money-making; it means the 'payoff' in terms of damage to the enemy is high.
Synonymsvaluablehigh value
“It helps that their Abu Dhabi ownership opened their wallets to ensure top scorer Khadija Shaw performed a U-turn in May and signed a lucrative new contract.”
“They can then be resold after five years, which has become a lucrative business.”
Borrowed from French lucratif, from Latin lucrativus (“profitable”), from lucratus, past participle of lucror (“to gain”), from lucrum (“gain”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *leh₂w- (“profit, gain”). Compare Spanish lucrar. By surface analysis, lucre + -ative.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.