Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Practicing or marked by economy, as in the expenditure of money or the use of material resources. synonym: sparing.
  • adjective Simple or costing little; meager or inexpensive.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Economical in use or expenditure; avoiding unnecessary expenditure either of money or of anything else which is to be used or consumed; sparing; not prodigal or lavish.
  • Characterized by or indicating economy.
  • Synonyms Choice, careful, chary, thrifty.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Economical in the use or appropriation of resources; not wasteful or lavish; wise in the expenditure or application of force, materials, time, etc.; characterized by frugality; sparing; economical; saving
  • adjective Obtained by, or appropriate to, economy.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Avoiding unnecessary expenditure either of money or of anything else which is to be used or consumed; avoiding waste.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective avoiding waste

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin frūgālis, virtuous, thrifty, from frūx, frūg-, fruit, virtue.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin frugalis "virtuous, thrifty"

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Examples

Comments

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  • It means thrifty. My grandma uses this word all the time, even though many people don't know what it means.

    October 1, 2010

  • adjective: not spending much money (but spending wisely)

    Monte was no miser, but was simply frugal, wisely spending the little that he earned.

    October 11, 2016