tiptoe
Americannoun
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tiptoes
plural
verb (used without object)
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tiptoes,
present (3rd person singular)
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tiptoed,
past participle, past
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tiptoeing
present participle
adjective
-
characterized by standing or walking on tiptoe.
-
straining upward.
-
eagerly expectant.
-
cautious; stealthy.
adverb
idioms
verb
-
to walk with the heels off the ground and the weight supported by the ball of the foot and the toes
-
to walk silently or stealthily
noun
adverb
adjective
-
walking or standing on tiptoe
-
stealthy or silent
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
tiptoesimple
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tiptoessimple
-
have tiptoedperfect
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has tiptoedperfect
-
am tiptoeingprogressive
-
are tiptoeingprogressive
-
is tiptoeingprogressive
-
have been tiptoeingperfect progressive
-
has been tiptoeingperfect progressive
Past
-
tiptoedsimple
-
had tiptoedperfect
-
was tiptoeingprogressive
-
were tiptoeingprogressive
-
had been tiptoeingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of tiptoe
1350–1400; Middle English tiptoon (plural noun). See tip 1, toe
Explanation
To tiptoe is to walk with your weight on your toes, moving quietly. If you're late to your yoga class and everyone's lying still with their eyes closed, you may want to tiptoe to your mat. You can also use tiptoe as a noun or an adjective: "She had to stand on her tiptoes to reach the cabinet where the cookies are kept." Figuratively, you tiptoe when you avoid a certain topic: "There's no need to tiptoe around the subject of money—I don't mind talking about it." The variation tippy toes dates from the early 1800s.
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:
If you can’t remember what it was like to try to tiptoe while swooning, your heart barely able to stay in your chest, you were never a teenager.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 19, 2026
He is betting the Western alliance will be healthier if America’s allies candidly air their disagreements with the president, rather than tiptoe around him.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 27, 2026
Put all together, investors may remain understandably uneasy about the topic, even if they start to tiptoe back into oversold areas.
From Barron's ● Feb. 25, 2026
We tiptoe around finances because we’ve been programmed by society to link our personal value to our financial status.
From MarketWatch ● Jan. 7, 2026
They hoped to wait until the coast was clear, then tiptoe out and let the others back into the building.
From "Most Dangerous: Daniel Ellsberg and the Secret History of the Vietnam War" by Steve Sheinkin
That mordant humor, however enjoyable, tiptoes around the unanswerable question of how, or even whether, we can tell the difference between cosplay and the real thing.
From Salon ● Jun. 7, 2026
On that overcast morning with the F-150, Hummel stood on his tiptoes and reached both arms overhead into the tight crevices under the pickup.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 7, 2026
Behind them, a slim figure reaches up on tiptoes, but the 1-month pad is still out of her reach.
From Slate ● Jul. 21, 2025
The ghost isn’t as hostile as a mother who lets her daughter flounder, or as a husband who tiptoes off to call lawyers about a possible legal separation rather than communicate with his wife.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 23, 2025
Finn stood on tiptoes and peered at the screen.
From "The Strangers" by Margaret Peterson Haddix
I slipped on waterproof shoes, grabbed a pair of shears and, still in my pajamas, tiptoed down the grand staircase of the château and out onto the dewy grass of the garden.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 4, 2026
He tiptoed around the house, the camera held out in front of him, sometimes for up to 10 minutes for a continuous shot.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 15, 2025
In a haunting approach, the parents tiptoed toward an eerily lifelike replica of their child’s body and carefully transferred the silicone doppelgänger to an operating table.
From New York Times ● May 24, 2024
The Dow Jones Industrial Average tiptoed less than 0.1% lower to 38,892.80, while the Nasdaq composite inched 5 points higher to 16,253.96.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 9, 2024
They dressed quietly, used the bathroom quickly and tiptoed down the stairs into the dark hall.
From "Homecoming" by Cynthia Voigt
Any hope Infantino might have had of tiptoeing away from the scene of his World Cup private-investment wreckage having sustained only minor damage to his reputation has been obliterated.
From BBC ● Aug. 1, 2026
Investors tiptoeing back into Chinese stocks may want to consider companies that would benefit both from the rise of AI and a potential effort by Beijing to boost consumption.
From Barron's ● Dec. 27, 2025
“Be back in a minute,” Peggy Jo told her mother, tiptoeing past her room.
From Slate ● Nov. 15, 2025
Instead, the strategic calculation appears to have been that you can fold some of the groypers back into mainstream conservativism, but only by tiptoeing around the flaws of their putative leaders.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 6, 2025
They survey the snack table and grab Capri Suns before tiptoeing through the water as if there were sea creatures lurking at the bottom of the shallow pool.
From "South of Somewhere" by Kalena Miller
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.
