Valuable means worth a lot of money, or worth a lot of care. A valuable painting, valuable experience, a valuable lesson.
The two senses run together: valuable advice costs nothing and is worth having. Valuables as a plural noun means possessions worth stealing — leave no valuables in the car. Note invaluable, which means so valuable that no price can be put on it and is therefore stronger rather than negative, which surprises people; and valueless, which is the real opposite.
1adjectivevaluableWorth a lot of money.
“The painting turned out to be valuable and badly insured.”
2adjectivecareWorth a lot of care or attention.
“It was valuable experience and thoroughly unpleasant.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
valuable is a quality of worth.
From value + -able.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA