platter
Americannoun
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platters
plural
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a large, shallow dish, usually elliptical in shape, for holding and serving food, especially meat or fish.
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a course of a meal, usually consisting of a variety of foods served on the same plate.
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Slang. a phonograph record.
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Computers. a hard disk, the rigid circular plate that rotates on a spindle within a hard disk drive, for data encoding and retrieval.
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Movie Slang. a part of a motion-picture projector, consisting of a large, horizontally rotating disk that houses a feature film.
noun
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a large shallow usually oval dish or plate, used for serving food
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a course of a meal, usually consisting of several different foods served on the same plate
a seafood platter
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of platter
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English plater, from Anglo-French, derivative of plat “dish”; see origin at plate 1, -er 2
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:
The kitchen scenes are a combo platter of boot camp, frat house hazing ritual and kung fu movie.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 6, 2026
"You can't offer anything on a silver platter and unfortunately, we did a couple of times."
From BBC ● Jul. 10, 2026
It made me kill some of my darlings and really focus on what I want this sampler platter to be.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 18, 2026
Most people encounter ranch mix in its intended form, stirred into mayonnaise or sour cream and served alongside a platter of vegetables.
From Salon ● Jun. 2, 2026
Oliver looked at the tree and then at the cookie platter, noticing that only one cookie was left.
From "The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street" by Karina Yan Glaser
The pair are inseparable, with Margarita accompanying her mother to chemotherapy treatments and their own special celebration rituals involving karaoke and sharing combo platters.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 16, 2026
An army of servers brings out platters with choucroute, then Alsace cheeses and the traditional kougelhopf pudding.
From BBC ● Jun. 6, 2026
Take, for example, elaborate platters of vegetable crudité, complete with cottage cheese, yellow mustard and a sausage or two.
From Salon ● May 24, 2026
The luxury party planner recently threw a “K-pop Demon Hunters” birthday party for an 8-year-old in a New Jersey Country club where they served platters of sushi.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 2, 2026
I took both our plates into the kitchen, where the platters of kabob and rice took up every square inch of available counter space.
From "Darius the Great Is Not Okay" by Adib Khorram
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.
