(lowercase) a road, airport runway, parking area, etc., paved with Tarmac, tarmacadam, or a layer of tar.
(lowercase) a layer or covering of Tarmac, tarmacadam, or tar.
Full name: tarmacadam. a paving material that consists of crushed stone rolled and bound with a mixture of tar and bitumen, esp as formerly used for a road, airport runway, etc See also macadam
a runway at an airport
on the tarmac at Nairobi airport
If your airplane is on the tarmac, that means you're either just about to take off or you've just landed. Either way, the tarmac is the paved runway at the airport. The term tarmac refers to the area of an airport where airplanes taxi, or pull up to a gate, or head out to the runway. The runway itself is also called the tarmac. The name comes from a specific tar-based paving material that's also commonly used on roads. Originally, the word was trademarked as shorthand for tarmacadam, "tar mixed with crushed rock."
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Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
One day, I drove from Jena down to the Alexandria staging facility, one of the rare ICE detention structures situated directly on Tarmac.
From Slate ● Jun. 19, 2025
Building firms Tarmac and Lightwater Holdings, which gifted the land, said they would work with the heritage organisations to help preserve the site and improve public access to it.
From BBC ● Feb. 3, 2023
“Nothing excites compassion, in friend and foe alike,” he wrote, “as much as the sight of you ker-splonked on the Tarmac with your propeller buried six feet under.”
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 30, 2016
Tarmac softens in hot weather which would likely cause a heavy airplane to sink into it.
From Forbes ● Sep. 18, 2014
Tarmac The line of departure on the field.
From Aces Up by Clarke, Covington
On Thursday, Hugging Face’s chief executive, Clément Delangue, posted a photo of an airport tarmac to X. “Heading to San Francisco to have a little chat with that ‘rogue agent,’ ” he wrote.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026
"They had their drums and guitars and stuff on the tarmac to entertain themselves," she said.
From BBC ● Jul. 18, 2026
This was an era during which “you could just walk onto the tarmac without a ticket,” said Brendan Koerner, author of The Skies Belong to Us.
From Slate ● Jul. 7, 2026
They were standing behind him on the tarmac outside of Air Force One when he said it.
From Salon ● Jul. 3, 2026
The plane had so little gas that the engine quit a moment after our wheels hit the tarmac.
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
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.
