trite

UK/tɹaɪt/US/tɹaɪt/

adjectiveC1Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #9,216 of 15,258neutral

Trite means dull from being said far too many times. A trite observation, sounds trite, trite but true.

It condemns the phrase rather than the idea, and trite but true is the standard defence of saying it anyway. The Latin means worn out, from the verb meaning to rub away — a trite remark has been rubbed smooth by use.

Definitions of trite

1adjectivetriteDull from being said far too many times.C1
“The film's ending felt trite, with the two lovers kissing in the rain.”

trite is a quality.

Where it comes from

Latin tritus means worn out, from terere, to rub or wear away. Attrition is a relative.

Proto-Indo-European
*terh₁-
Latin
trītus
English, today
trite

Built from

terō · Latin — to wear away, wear out

From Latin trītus. From Latin trītus (“worn out”), perfect passive participle of terō (“to wear away, wear out”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

trite in the wild

"Dumb bomb" was used for a time, but many military circles felt it sounded trite, and eventually "gravity bomb" gained popularity.
Unguided bomb
Strauss' waltz brims with a confidence typical of his maturity, containing musical ideas that are never trite, although he wrote waltzes at a prodigious rate.
Gross-Wien
The only species is the straight-line sulphur (Rhabdodryas trite).
Rhabdodryas
R. trite puddles with other yellows and sulphurs including the statira sulphur (Aphrissa statira) and apricot sulphur (Phoebis argante); and orange-banded sulphur (Phoebis philea).
Rhabdodryas

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

the terō family

trite detrimental contrite

trite — used about once every 4,294 pages · #9,216 · point at the bar for the others

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