rent-a-crowd

noun

A group of people who are paid to attend an event to increase attendance figures, rather than attending of their own volition.

Ask AI about this wordChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

Meanings

nounrent-a-crowd (plural rent-a-crowds)

plural rent-a-crowds

  1. A group of people who are paid to attend an event to increase attendance figures, rather than attending of their own volition.

Origin

From rent-a- + crowd. The term is derived from a fictional company, Rentacrowd Ltd., mentioned in the Peter Simple (Michael Wharton) columns in the UK Daily Telegraph newspaper.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

rent-a-crowd. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/rent-a-crowd

MLA

“rent-a-crowd.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/rent-a-crowd. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “rent-a-crowd,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/rent-a-crowd.

Source: rent-a-crowd on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.