paywall

noun

pay·​wall ˈpā-ˌwȯl 

: a system that prevents Internet users from accessing certain web content without a paid subscription

Examples of paywall in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Anthropic initially told Axios the model had gotten around a paywall, but Georgia’s secretary of state’s office said Monday that Anthropic had confirmed the model had not bypassed a paywall and had used the state’s public Data Hub. — Shae Lake, Fortune, 29 Oct. 2026

Will this intelligence lead to higher subscriptions and paywalls? — Andrew J. Hawkins, The Verge, 27 Oct. 2026

Creators of these partisan sites further stand to benefit from the fact that artificial intelligence tools are constantly scraping content from news websites without paywalls. — Clara Harter, Los Angeles Times, 25 Oct. 2026

But where Meta’s Muse is free to download, OpenAI’s Dots is still behind a $100/month paywall. — Jonquilyn Hill, Vox, 25 Oct. 2026

Word History

Etymology

pay entry 1 + firewall

First Known Use

2004, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for paywall

• aldol
• armhole
• atoll
• awol
• backhaul
• banal
• baseball
• befall
• cabal
• catchall
• cecal
• centrale

Kids Definition

paywall

noun

pay·​wall ˈpā-ˌwȯl 

: a system that prevents Internet users from accessing certain Web content without a paid subscription