From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishcostlycost‧ly /ˈkɒstli $ ˈkɒːstli/ ●●○ adjective 1 EXPENSIVEvery expensive, especially wasting a lot of money a complex and costly procedure Such a database would be extremely costly to set up.► see thesaurus at expensive2 PROBLEMsomething that is costly causes a lot of problems or trouble His delay in making a decision could prove costly in the long run. —costliness noun [uncountable]
Examples from the Corpus
costly• The finance committee rejected their plan because they said it was too costly.• Maximum use of state-of-the-art technology in place of costly and often error-prone personnel.• A lawsuit would be costly and we would probably lose.• Caring for the park's swans is a costly business - roughly $26,600 per year.• Convening production lines to largely automated production of flat panel sets would be costly in the short term.• Several of the gifts were costly, including a cup of gold and a crystal salt-set.• Taylor's pinched nerve has been the team's most costly injury this season.• Buying all those computers was a costly mistake.• From a cash-flow standpoint, that is less costly than actually paying your corporation an additional $ 200 in interest.• Yet the effort, far more costly than anything ever attempted by any government, has not produced the expected returns.• Purchase of market share is seen to be less costly than establishing brands - and is quicker too.• Punitive damages potentially could be much more costly to cigarette companies than compensatory damages.• Producers must receive a higher price to produce these more costly units. 7 Price and quantity supplied are directly related.prove costly• Dimas Teixeira's decision to stand off Beckham quickly proved costly.• Failure to protect yourself adequately could prove costly.• Still, there was, at times, an element of complacency in de Gaulle's approach, which proved costly.• Yet even now there is a sense of denial that could prove costly.• Mr Collin thinks that could prove costly and time consuming.• The war proved costly for both companies.• Vacant possession will be delayed and will prove costly, if not virtually impossible, to obtain.• Boeing Learns a Lesson in Predictability Mass layoffs prove costly in upswing when workers have taken skills, loyalty elsewhere. 