1.
cost; expense; expenditure
The amount of money, time, or resources required for something. Commonly used in business contexts for financial expenses.
Usage
A business loanword. コスト covers what something costs to make, run, or maintain - it is the producer's side of the ledger, not the price a customer pays. For a price tag use 値段 or 価格, and for a fee or fare 料金.
Common collocations
- コスト削減 (cost reduction)
- コスト管理 (cost management)
- コスト意識 (cost consciousness)
- 製造コスト (manufacturing costs)
- 運営コスト (operating costs)
- 初期コスト (initial costs)
- コストがかかる (to be costly)
- コストを抑える (to keep costs down)
Forms
コスパ is the clipped form of コストパフォーマンス (cost performance), and is far more common than the full phrase in speech: コスパがいい / 悪い (good / poor value for money). Note that コスパ is about value to the buyer, so unlike コスト itself it is used freely about everyday purchases.
Japanese equivalents
- 費用 - cost, expense; the general native word, usable anywhere コスト is
- 経費 - expenses in the accounting sense, the ones a company books and reimburses
コスト sounds current and businesslike and dominates in management and manufacturing contexts; 費用 is the safer choice in ordinary writing.