white tie

1. 1.

   bow tie worn as part of a man's formal evening dress

   Broaderbow tie
2. 2.

   formalwear consisting of full evening dress for men

   Synonymsdress suitfull dresstailcoattail coattailswhite tie and tails

   Broaderformalwear

   Partsswallow-tailed coat

Questions about white tie

What does white tie mean?

white tie means "bow tie worn as part of a man's formal evening dress". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

What is another word for white tie?

Close synonyms include dress suit, full dress, tailcoat, tail coat, tails. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is white tie a common word?

white tie is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.