Definition
Begrudge means to envy or resent someone for their possessions, achievements, or advantages. It can also mean to give or allocate something reluctantly or with ill-will.
Pronunciation
US English
UK English
See Synonyms, Antonyms and Usage
Excerpts from News Articles
1
His calculation ignores the fact that with less efficient cars people might have driven less far. But it is hard to begrudge him the oversight, especially since his invention is not yet done helping the climate.
2
Want to Nosh: Please, do not begrudge your hostess the fact that you paid for some rubber gloves.
3
“He thinks he’s the number one politician in the world and that Joe Biden is way, way below him, and even further down [are] leaders like Macron and Scholz,” the former minister said, adding that it isn’t healthy and augurs badly. Like others, he mentioned that the Ukrainian leader seems to begrudge sharing the stage or the limelight, much like an actor wanting all the best lines, while a former Zelenskyy aide said his office is always scouring polling data to check no one is eclipsing him.
4
Anna Krajinska, T&E’s vehicle emissions and air quality manager, said: “We don’t begrudge carmakers their record profits, but claims that they cannot afford cheap pollution fixes are simply corporate greed. The auto industry is maximising profits by selling more expensive premium vehicles while at the same time pretending pollution rules would make cars unaffordable. EU lawmakers need to put public health before the industry’s money grab.”
5
Jin Park begrudges the couple’s lack of access to housing benefits granted to newlyweds in South Korea. However, their small apartment lets the couple be “cozy and intimate” together. It is crowded with wedding photos, plants, rainbow ornaments and bikes.
6
“The first thing he said was, ’This is a very reluctant relationship. I don’t want any sentimentality in this movie and not between these two people. I want this to be a sort of begrudging connection.’”
7
Begrudging words: “Look, they found quite a good parliamentary wheeze, but they can’t escape the fact that they failed to support our plan to fine water companies when they dump sewage,” a Labour insider sighed to Playbook in response. “It’s all very clever, but they’ve ultimately put themselves on the side of the water companies against the public.”
8
It is difficult to begrudge anyone for celebrating the downfall of far-right provocateur Tucker Carlson, ignominiously ejected from Fox News. Slack-jawed, spitting rage, his tirades were calculated at stirring the resentment of angry white America: from declaring that immigrants made the US dirtier and poorer to embracing the “great replacement theory”, which spreads the noxious lie that the authorities were deliberately “undermining democracy” by replacing US-born Americans with immigrants.
9
As a reward for their begrudging support of Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s call for legislation he said would strengthen his bargaining power against President Biden, right-wing conservatives earned the chance to take another debt limit vote sometime this summer.
10
But Mr Putin is nevertheless said to begrudge what he regards as the alliance’s gradual sprawl eastwards, which saw ex-Soviet satellites Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland join in 1999, followed by Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia in 2004.
