placard
Americannoun
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placards
plural
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a paperboard sign or notice, as one posted in a public place or carried by a demonstrator or picketer.
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Armor. placate.
verb (used with object)
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placards,
present (3rd person singular)
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placarded,
past participle, past
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placarding
present participle
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to display placards on or in.
The square was placarded by peace marchers.
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to publicize, announce, or advertise by means of placards.
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to post as a placard.
noun
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a printed or written notice for public display; poster
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a small plaque or card
verb
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to post placards on or in
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to publicize or advertise by placards
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to display as a placard
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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placardsimple
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placardssimple
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have placardedperfect
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has placardedperfect
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am placardingprogressive
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are placardingprogressive
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is placardingprogressive
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have been placardingperfect progressive
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has been placardingperfect progressive
Past
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placardedsimple
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had placardedperfect
-
was placardingprogressive
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were placardingprogressive
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had been placardingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of placard
Explanation
A placard is a sign, especially one that advertises something. You might get a summer job standing on the sidewalk, holding a placard that announces a mattress sale — though it may not be your dream job. A concert poster, a storefront notice, a protest sign carried in a rally — each of these is a type of placard. A placard can be as impermanent as a square of cardboard with a scrawled message, and as official as a permanent plaque marking a historic building. The Old French word plaquier is at the root of placard, and it means "to plaster or to lay flat."
Vocabulary lists containing placard
The Sun Is Also a Star
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Eats, Shoots & Leaves
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Johnny Tremain
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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.
See Examples For:
“We don’t forgive or forget,” one placard said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 6, 2026
"For the blood of the martyrs, sing the national anthem with firmness and without hesitation," read one placard.
From Barron's ● May 13, 2026
"I wrote on my placard: 'People! Let's stop the war. We bear responsibility for peace on Planet Earth!'"
From BBC ● Oct. 30, 2025
"We are not here for disorder. We're demanding the truth of the ballot," a placard read.
From BBC ● Oct. 26, 2025
The small room was perfectly clean except for a placard attached to the back of the door.
From "Black Like Me" by John Howard Griffin
The council’s signage was then replaced with placards urging residents to fight back against the parking plans.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 6, 2026
"They cannot exclude Maria Corina Machado, because she is a fundamental leader for all of us," declared Davila amid a sea of placards and flags.
From Barron's ● Jul. 31, 2026
Just a short walk away, protesters marched under placards calling for his ousting as chants demanding an end to the resort project echoed off government buildings.
From Barron's ● Jun. 12, 2026
To make that clear, some participants have been carrying placards calling for the imprisonment of PD leader Sali Berisha – who is facing separate corruption charges – as well as Rama.
From BBC ● Jun. 4, 2026
No one seemed to care about another student strike, and people walked past the tanks without stopping to read the placards hanging from the university facade.
From "The House of the Spirits: A Novel" by Isabel Allende
The Ben Crump Law website is placarded with numerous recent cable news appearances, many conducted from his Tallahassee home during quarantine.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 18, 2020
A Florida realtor followed Bryan's motor in another bungalow on wheels, placarded : "Ask us about Tampa ! Ask us ! Ask us!"
From Time Magazine Archive
They had placarded the ruins with huge portraits of Stalin and with posters that proclaimed: "The destruction of the German nation is not among the aims of the United Nations."
From Time Magazine Archive
The health authorities, unable to find a law to compel Mother Goodman to do what she did not want to do with her brood, placarded the house and went away.
From Time Magazine Archive
Quickly the whole country was placarded with posters headed "R.R.R.," with all sorts of variations and additions of the original phrase.
From Under Four Administrations From Cleveland to Taft by Oscar S. Straus
The 'folly of the Cross,' the placarding of our human weakness, is something more intimate than the mere stripping off of outward paraphernalia.
From Time Magazine Archive
No speaker mentioned Adlai Stevenson, and his picture was not among the big portraits of party leaders placarding the hall.
From Time Magazine Archive
Michel, however, advised a beginning, but simply by placarding Article 68 of the Constitution.
From The History of a Crime The Testimony of an Eye-Witness by Victor Hugo
This first placarding of one's name is a peculiar and mixed sensation.
From That Fortune by Charles Dudley Warner
The company was sending men over Market Street, picking out the few individuals who owned vacant lots, leasing them for the month and preparing to justify the placarding and patrolling that already had been done.
From In the Heart of a Fool by William Allen White
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.
