tenant

American  

[ten-uhnt] / ˈtɛn ənt /

noun

• tenants
  plural

1. 

   a person or group that rents and occupies land, a house, an office, or the like, from another for a period of time; lessee.

2. Law. a person who holds or possesses for a time lands, tenements, or personalty of another, usually for rent.

3. an occupant or inhabitant of any place.

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verb (used with object)

1. to hold or occupy as a tenant; dwell in; inhabit.

verb (used without object)

1. to dwell or live (usually followed byin ).

tenant British  

/ ˈtɛnənt /

noun

1. a person who holds, occupies, or possesses land or property by any kind of right or title, esp from a landlord under a lease

2. a person who has the use of a house, flat, etc, subject to the payment of rent

3. any holder or occupant

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verb

1. (tr) to hold (land or property) as a tenant

2. rare to dwell

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• nontenant
  noun
• nontenantable
  adjective
• tenant-like
  adjective
• tenantable
  adjective
• tenantless
  adjective
• tenantlike
  adjective
• untenantable
  adjective
• untenanted
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• tenants
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of tenant

1250–1300; Middle English tena ( u ) nt < Anglo-French; Middle French tenant, noun use of present participle of tenir to hold ≪ Latin tenēre. See -ant

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Explanation

A tenant is someone who lives in a place owned by someone else, usually paying rent. If you blast your music and let the cat pee in the corner, your landlord will not think that you're a very good tenant. Tenant is often used to mean "renter," but it can mean anyone who has the right to live in a particular place, either because he signed a lease, which is a rental agreement, because he owns the land, or because government gave him a title to it. If you live in a big apartment building, you should be aware of your rights as a tenant, which usually include things like having heat in the winter and proper fire escapes.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

tenant tenants

Raman, whose campaign did not respond to an interview request, served until recently as chair of the City Council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee, where she championed tenant rights.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 16, 2026

The restaurant's proprietor Ricky McMenemy, who has worked there for 35 years, will become a commercial tenant of the conservation charity.

From BBC ● Oct. 14, 2026

Paris Henken, a US competitive sailor, said in a viral Instagram post that she had been a tenant of one of the buildings now on the brink of collapse.

From Barron's ● Oct. 12, 2026

Lawrence began local advocacy for affordable housing through the Michigan Rent Is Too Damn High Coalition, a tenant union he founded in 2023.

From MarketWatch ● Oct. 6, 2026

After the war young men from tenant farms all over the county flocked to Maycomb and erected matchbox wooden houses and started families.

From "Go Set a Watchman: A Novel" by Harper Lee

In 2023, she helped establish “just cause” eviction protections and timelines for tenants to repay rent after falling behind.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 16, 2026

Landlords complain that evicting tenants who stop paying rent can take months, leaving them to cover mortgage payments and other costs, and that changing rules on renting create legal uncertainty.

From Barron's ● Oct. 15, 2026

I’ll touch on three of the nastier downsides, starting with bad tenants.

From MarketWatch ● Oct. 14, 2026

Six unsuccessful eviction attempts followed as Abascal spoke publicly of her plight and in defense of other vulnerable tenants.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 8, 2026

Somewhere along the line they started buying buildings, apartments, and houses, and now they had six properties with eighteen tenants.

From "Zeitoun" by Dave Eggers

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Related Words

• dweller
• holder
• inhabitant
• occupant
• renter
• resident

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