noun
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a mat, placed at the entrance to a building, for wiping dirt from shoes
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informal a person who offers little resistance to ill-treatment by others
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of doormat
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:
A note the attackers left under his doormat read "No Data Centers."
From Barron's ● May 19, 2026
Then he transformed Indiana, a longtime Big Ten doormat, into a national championship contender.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 30, 2025
I don’t want to nag, but neither do I want to be a doormat.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 9, 2025
Shailene Woodley, who plays author Gia in “Three Women” — a stand-in for Taddeo — was impressed by how Gilpin gave agency to Lina, who could easily have come across as a doormat.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 9, 2025
I can’t explain this, except to remind you that I lived with a bully and a doormat.
From "Please Ignore Vera Dietz" by A.S. King
But at the college level, the powerhouses typically remained the powerhouses while schools like Indiana were their doormats.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 18, 2026
Labour MP Liam Byrne, chair of the committee, said: "It's high time for the circus of recent weeks to end and for cheques to start landing on the doormats of innocent victims."
From BBC ● Mar. 7, 2024
In some of the buildings, everything from the doormats to the staff’s uniforms was branded with the Trump name.
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 18, 2024
Along with, say, People, Time and National Geographic, it has long lined the dentist offices, neighbors’ doormats and coffee tables of your life.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 1, 2023
“They’re not doormats, but they know they’re up against kids who have had more resources. I’ve seen it. They feel intimidated sometimes, even by kids from Pennsbury.”
From "Drama High" by Michael Sokolove
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.
