noun
waitress
WAY-trihs
noun
1
A woman who serves customers at their tables in a restaurant or café.
"The waitress brought over our menus and a jug of water."
How to Use Waitress
Learner’s notesIn plain EnglishA female server in a restaurant — increasingly replaced by the gender-neutral term "server" in modern usage.
UK vs US
Many workplaces now prefer "server" over gendered terms like "waiter"/"waitress".
Easily confused with
Word Forms
waitressed past tense, waitresses plural, waitresses singular
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The _____ brought over our menus and a jug of water.
Etymology
Formed from "waiter" plus the feminine suffix "-ess", first recorded in the 1830s.