Miss.
A form of address, now used chiefly for an unmarried woman; used chiefly of girls before the mid-1700s, and thereafter used also of adult women without regard to marital status.
Meaning & usage
A form of address, now used chiefly for an unmarried woman; used chiefly of girls before the mid-1700s, and thereafter used also of adult women without regard to marital status.
A form of address, now used chiefly for an unmarried woman; used chiefly of girls before the mid-1700s, and thereafter used also of adult women without regard to marital status. With a surname.
These are the two young ladies that I wanted you to meet, Miss Jones and Miss Robinson.
A form of address, now used chiefly for an unmarried woman; used chiefly of girls before the mid-1700s, and thereafter used also of adult women without regard to marital status. With a full name.
The victim was named as Miss Jane Doe.
A form of address, now used chiefly for an unmarried woman; used chiefly of girls before the mid-1700s, and thereafter used also of adult women without regard to marital status. With a first name only.
Excuse me Ma'am, will Miss Julia and Miss Emily be staying for tea?
A form of address, now used chiefly for an unmarried woman; used chiefly of girls before the mid-1700s, and thereafter used also of adult women without regard to marital status. Used alone.
Good morning, Miss. May I help you?
A form of address for a female teacher or a waitress.
Excuse me, Miss, Donny's been pinching my pencils again.
Used in title of the (female) winner of a beauty contest, or certain other types of contest, prefixing the country or other region that she represents, or the category of contest.
Ladies and gentlemen, please give a round of applause to our lovely new Miss Yorkshire!
And I can now announce that this year's Miss Personality is ... Doris Miggins!
Used in a mock title to point out some quality, or alleged quality, of a girl or woman.
Don't ask me, ask Miss know-it-all over there.
Where this word comes from
From mistress.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.