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toilet

American  
[toi-lit] / ˈtɔɪ lɪt /

noun

  1. a bathroom fixture consisting of a bowl, usually with a detachable, hinged seat and lid, and a device for flushing with water, used for defecation and urination.

  2. a lavatory.

  3. a bathroom.

  4. toilet bowl.

  5. a dressing room, especially one containing a bath.

  6. the act or process of dressing or grooming oneself, including bathing and arranging the hair.

    to make one's toilet; busy at her toilet.

  7. toilet set.

  8. the dress or costume of a person; any particular costume.

    toilet of white silk.

  9. Surgery. the cleansing of a part after childbirth or a wound after an operation.

  10. Archaic. dressing table.

idioms

  1. go down / in the toilet, to become worthless or profitless; be doomed.

    The team's entire season went down the toilet.
toilet British  
/ ˈtɔɪlɪt /

noun

  1. another word for lavatory

  2. old-fashioned the act of dressing and preparing oneself

    to make one's toilet

  3. old-fashioned a dressing table or the articles used when making one's toilet

  4. rare costume

  5. the cleansing of a wound, etc, after an operation or childbirth

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of toilet

1530–40; < French toilette small cloth, doily, dressing table, equivalent to toile toil 2 + -ette -et

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

What if Jesse decorates the house with toilet paper?

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 27, 2026

Unicharm has been able to recycle these materials into products with less rigorous sanitary requirements, like toilet paper.

From Barron's • Mar. 25, 2026

Stacy, being a Manhattan lady who lunches, loves her 24-carat gold creature comforts too much to join Preston on his Montana fishing trips because he never installed an indoor toilet.

From Salon • Mar. 23, 2026

Crozier said: "I couldn't believe what I was seeing, I saw actual toilet sewerage material and things like sanitary products. So how can that be treated water?"

From BBC • Mar. 21, 2026

I absentmindedly doodled one on my homework last night and had to tear it into a billion pieces and flush them down the toilet.

From "Linked" by Gordon Korman

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.