tuxedo
Americannoun
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Also called dinner jacket. a man's jacket for semiformal evening dress, traditionally of black or dark-blue color and characteristically having satin or grosgrain facing on the lapels.
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the complete semiformal outfit, including this jacket, dark trousers, often with silk stripes down the sides, a bow tie, and usually a cummerbund.
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of tuxedo
1890–95, short for Tuxedo coat, after country club at Tuxedo Park, N.Y.
Explanation
Use the noun tuxedo to describe the dressy black suit that many men wear when they get married. It's not prom night without one of these formal jackets for men, which take their name from Tuxedo Park, New York, near New York City. The place name tuxedo, according to one line of etymological inquiry, is from an Algonquian word for "wolf," p'tuksit, while other scholars guess that it simply means "crooked river," p'tuck-sepo. Either way, a tuxedo today can also be called a dinner jacket or even the slangy "monkey suit," just for fun.
Vocabulary lists containing tuxedo
English Words Derived from Indigenous Languages of the Americas
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Aquatic, Waddle, and Plumage: Penguin Parlance
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Prom Time
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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.
If a man has forgotten a tie for his tuxedo, they have a collection to select from.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 19, 2026
Among the pieces available were a vintage chest, tables, and chair, antique mirrors, hand-knotted rugs, a striped fabric tuxedo sofa, upholstered wing back chairs, “lots of fun lamps and chandeliers,” and several leather chairs.
From MarketWatch • May 18, 2026
“I feel trapped in a tuxedo, like I have claustrophobia,” Almodóvar says, hugging his body as if he’s wearing a straitjacket.
From Los Angeles Times • May 11, 2026
The King and president wore black tuxedo suits and white shirts.
From BBC • Apr. 28, 2026
The image she’d chosen showed a lean woman in motion, her shimmering dress whipped around her limber body as a man in a tuxedo dragged her across the dance floor.
From "Shooting Kabul" by N. H. Senzai
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.
