underinvest

U1N1D2E1R1I1N1V4E1S1T1

verb

To invest insufficiently.

Opposite
Scrabble 15

Meanings

verbunderinvest (third-person singular simple present underinvests, present participle underinvesting, simple past and past participle underinvested)

present singular third person underinvests · participle present underinvesting · participle past underinvested · past underinvested

  1. businessTo invest insufficiently.

    Rentokil was exposed as a business whose managers had underinvested to keep up with past glories.

    2009 January 17, Nils Pratley, “Nils Pratley on Saturday: How to change unjust deserts”, in The Guardian
    1 more example

    The company also underinvested in creating an ecosystem for people to easily expand Alexa’s abilities, in the way that Apple had done with its App Store, which helped stoke interest in the iPhone, the person said.

    2023 March 15, Brian X. Chen, Nico Grant, Karen Weise, “How Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant Lost the A.I. Race”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

    Antonyms: overinvest

Synonyms & antonyms

verbTo invest insufficiently.

Opposite

Origin

  1. Proto-Indo-European*h₁én
  2. Proto-Indo-European*h₁entér
  3. Proto-Indo-European*h₂én
  4. Proto-Indo-European*dʰeh₁-?
  5. Proto-Indo-European*(H)n̥dʰí
  6. Proto-Indo-European*(H)n̥dʰér
  7. Proto-Germanic*under
  8. Proto-West Germanic*undar
  9. Old Englishunder-
  10. Middle Englishunder-
  11. Englishunder-
  12. Englishinvest
  13. Englishunderinvest

From under- + invest.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

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

MLA

“underinvest.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/underinvest. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “underinvest,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/underinvest.

Source: underinvest on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.