doorplate

American  

[dawr-pleyt, dohr-] / ˈdɔrˌpleɪt, ˈdoʊr- /

noun

1. a small identification plate on the outside door of a house or room, bearing the occupant's name, the apartment or house number, or the like.

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Etymology

Origin of doorplate

First recorded in 1815–25; door + plate ¹

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

doorplate

“A handwritten sign on a wall, a name on a doorplate, a flyer on a telephone pole, or an unusual magazine at a newsstand would spin me toward a story.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 10, 2025

So she 256allowed “ma’am,” like a homely fleck, to settle unreproved on the ancestral doorplate.

From The Missourian by Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle

Timothy concluded that she was not, after all, the lady of the house; and, remembering the marble doorplate in the orchard, tried again.

From Timothy's Quest A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It by Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin

Her own name was Jones, but the doorplate was very cheap, and her husband, she argued, might die, and then she might marry a man of the name of Wilkins.

From Some Private Views by James Payn

Why, it is a kind of a doorplate, after all, don't you see?

From Timothy's Quest A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It by Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin