parlay

verb

par·​lay ˈpär-ˌlā  -lē 

parlayed; parlaying; parlays

transitive verb

1

: to bet in a parlay

2

a

: to exploit successfully

He hoped to parlay his basketball skills into a college scholarship.

b

: to increase or otherwise transform into something of much greater value

She parlayed $5,000 and years of hard work into a multimillion-dollar company.

Did you know?

The word parlay originally belonged exclusively to gambling parlance, where to parlay is to take winnings from a previous bet, along with one’s original stake of money, and use them to make another bet or series of bets. The verb comes from the noun paroli, a borrowing from French—itself borrowed from Italian—that refers to a system of such betting. After decades of this specific use, not only did parlay start to be used as a noun synonymous with paroli, but English speakers upped the ante by using the verb figuratively in situations where someone uses or develops something—such as a skill or hard work—for the purpose of getting something else of even greater value.

Examples of parlay in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

When Vegas defenseman Jeremy Lauzon suffered an injury in the first round of the playoffs, Coghlan parlayed his confidence from the AHL into the biggest opportunity of his career. —Jesse Granger, New York Times, 21 May 2026

But the thread that hooked Howard was how Avedon parlayed his success and status in the world of pop culture to create stirring and thought-provoking images about the wider world. —Angelique Jackson, Variety, 20 May 2026

Hannah Einbinder plays Kris, an up-and-coming filmmaker who has parlayed Sundance success into a gig rebooting a once-popular horror franchise called Camp Miasma. —Richard Lawson, HollywoodReporter, 13 May 2026

But early polls have showed Schlossberg parlaying his Kennedy aura, name recognition and attention-grabbing social media chops into a shocking lead, with Bores also in the mix. —Dave Goldiner, New York Daily News, 9 May 2026

Word History

Etymology

verbal derivative (perhaps with conformation to parley entry 2 or French parler "to speak") of paroli "series of bets set up so that the original stake and winnings are placed on successive wagers," borrowed from French, borrowed from Italian, plural of parolo (stress on first syllable), of uncertain origin

Note: Apparently the earliest attestation of the Italian word is in the Italian-English dictionary of John Florio, Queen Anna's New World of Words, or Dictionarie of the Italian and English Tongues (London, 1611), in which Pároli is defined as "a grand part set or cast at dice," with a corresponding verb Paroláre "to set or play at a grand part at dice." French paroli first appears as a gloss of the Italian word in the Italian-French dictionary of Antoine Oudin, Recherches italiennes et françoises, ou Dictionnaire, contenant outre les mots ordinaires, une quantité de Proverbes & de Phrases (Paris, 1640), where Italian Paroli is glossed as "paroli, aux dez" ("paroli, at dice"). C. Battisti and G. Alessio (Dizionario etimologico italiano, Florence, 1954) characterize parolo as Neapolitan ("voce napoletano") and adduce additionally Sicilian pàrula "doppia posta nel giuoco del faraone o bassetta" ("double stake in the game of faro or basset [a game similar to faro]"), which they aver to be a derivative of paro "equal." Opposing these conjectures is the entry párolo in a list of dialect words from Lucca in Tuscany, along with their etymologies, compiled by Silvio Pieri ("Appunti etimologici," Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie, Band 30 [1903], p. 302). Pieri proposes that the word is a univerbation of paro lo "I offer it (hold it out)," referring to the sum wagered. This etymology is seconded by the Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, and the Trésor de la langue française.

First Known Use

1828, in the meaning defined at sense 1

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Kids Definition

parlay

verb

par·​lay

ˈpär-ˌlā, 

-lē

: to increase or change into something of much greater value

Etymology

from parlay "to make a series of bets so that winnings from earlier bets are all wagered on later contests," from French paroli (noun) "a parlayed bet," from an Italian dialect word paroli, plural of parolo "a parlayed bet," perhaps from para "equal"