cobrar

To charge (a price), to collect (a payment), or to earn/get paid (a salary) — three closely related senses learners often keep separate in English but Spanish folds into one verb: te voy a cobrar diez euros, cobré mi sueldo, cobra por hora. It also appears in fixed expressions like cobrar vida ("to come to life") and cobrar importancia ("to gain importance").

• El plomero me cobró cincuenta euros por la reparación. — The plumber charged me fifty euros for the repair.
• Todavía no he cobrado mi sueldo de este mes. — I still haven't been paid my salary for this month.
• La estatua parecía cobrar vida bajo la luz de la luna. — The statue seemed to come to life under the moonlight.

Cobrar means "to charge/collect," not "to pay" — a common false-friend mix-up is using cobrar when you mean pagar; the shop cobra you, you pagas the shop.

Often confused with pagar.

• expression "Cobrar vida" — A widely used fixed expression meaning "to come to life," applied to statues, stories, characters, or ideas that seem to take on a life of their own — confirmed as a standard idiom in Spanish dictionaries and usage references.