restaurant
Americannoun
-
restaurants
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of restaurant
An Americanism first recorded in 1820–30; from French, noun use of present participle of restaurer, from Latin restaurāre “to restore, reestablish”; cf. re- ( def. ), store
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How does restaurant compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
A restaurant is a place — usually inside a building — where you go to eat food, which, most of the time, you must pay for. Restaurant comes from the French restaurer, which means "to provide food for." Restaurants will provide food for you if you've got the cash, and most of the time they'll even let you sit down right there and eat it. Common examples of restaurants include burger joints, cafeterias, pizzerias, sandwich shops, steak houses, seafood shacks, (some) hot-dog stands, ice cream parlors, taquerias, Chinese takeout, (some) bakeries, and fine-dining establishments.
Vocabulary lists containing restaurant
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:
Cava wants more of its restaurant employees to make the jump to management.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 5, 2026
Post Office, a Coco’s restaurant and a Valvoline auto repair shop.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 5, 2026
It’s the sort of sandwich I’d happily pay a cute restaurant a slightly unreasonable amount of money to make for me.
From Salon ● Nov. 5, 2026
The state of Queensland, where the restaurant is located, is considered Australia's pineapple heartland and produces all of the country's commercially-grown pineapples.
From BBC ● Nov. 5, 2026
Her dad is a chef and wants to open a restaurant of his own, and her mom is a marine biologist.
From "Clairboyance" by Kristiana Kahakauwila
The pizza category has particularly struggled to increase business in recent years, with sales growth at pizza restaurants lagging behind the broader fast-food market.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 5, 2026
Kempczinski said that the company was remodeling restaurants in part to increase space to offer more drinks.
From MarketWatch ● Nov. 4, 2026
Cerca Trova was once the largest Outback Steakhouse franchisee, with 99 restaurants in 2018.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 4, 2026
A closely followed survey of service companies such as banks, retailers and restaurants registered 54.5% in October versus 54.9% in the prior month, the Institute for Supply Management said.
From MarketWatch ● Nov. 4, 2026
“But racetracks, restaurants . . . there are so many things to build. How much of my money do you think you will need?”
From "The Unseen Guest" by Maryrose Wood
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