tawdry
Americanadjective
-
(of finery, trappings, etc.) gaudy; showy and cheap.
- Synonyms:
- meretricious, flashy
- Antonyms:
- elegant
-
low or mean; base.
tawdry motives.
noun
adjective
Other Word Forms
- tawdrily adverb
- tawdriness noun
- untawdry adjective
Etymology
Origin of tawdry
1605–15; short for ( Sain ) t Audrey lace, i.e., neck lace bought at St. Audrey's Fair in Ely, England; so called after St. Audrey ( Old English Aethelthrȳth, died 679), Northumbrian queen and patron saint of Ely, who, according to tradition, died of a throat tumor which she considered just punishment of her youthful liking for neck laces
Explanation
Tawdry means cheap, shoddy, or tasteless. It can be used to describe almost anything from clothes to people to even events or affairs. You know that shiny black slip you picked up for nothing at a garage sale and used as the skirt of your lion-tamer Halloween costume? It's a bit tawdry. But it would really be tawdry if you wore it on a regular day out. Tawdry things often have a hint of desperation and immorality — like tawdry extramarital affairs or tawdry tales. With tawdry decorations and jewelry, quality has been exchanged for lots of flash and shine.
Vocabulary lists containing tawdry
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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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.
Admittedly, heaping this much flattery onto a tawdry piece of airport fiction adapted into a Sydney Sweeney-starring, big-screen sensation may seem hyperbolic.
From Salon • Jan. 31, 2026
When the New Deal put a cop on the Wall Street beat, Dillon cleaned up his act and lived long enough to outlast the memory of his tawdry methods.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 21, 2025
He called that meeting "the most vomit-inducing episode in all the tawdry history of international diplomacy".
From BBC • Aug. 18, 2025
The writer Morrow Mayo seldom minced words, especially when his subject was the gaudy, tawdry city where he made his home in the 1920s and 1930s.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 10, 2025
The Corporation would like you to know that they are deeply regretful of this tawdry display.
From "Beauty Queens" by Libba Bray
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.
