This is indeed true. See for example Lemma 2.60 in Kollar-Mori Birational Geometry of algebraic varieties. In particular, it is shown that a Cartier divisor $D$ is big if and only if $mD \sim A + E$ for some ample divisor $A$ and effective divisor $E$. This is also proven in Corollary 2.2.7 in Lazarsfeld's Positivity of in Algebraic Geometry I.
Anyway, they make no assumptions on the dimension or singularities of the ambient variety, you also don't need the nef assumption.

