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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

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Something used or included temporarily or as a substitute for something that is not known or must remain generic; that which holds, denotes or reserves a place for something to come later.

11 characters4 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈpleɪsˌhoʊldɚ/General-American
  1. Something used or included temporarily or as a substitute for something that is not known or must remain generic; that which holds, denotes or reserves a place for something to come later.

    This data is a placeholder, so you'll want to include the real numbers as soon as you have them.
  2. A non-editable caption initially displayed in a blank text box to indicate its function.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree English place Proto-Germanic *haldaną Proto-West Germanic *haldan Old English healdan Middle English holden English hold Proto-Indo-European *-yósder. Proto-Italic *-āzios Latin -āriusnom. Latin -āriusbor. Proto-Germanic *-ārijaz Proto-West Germanic *-ārī Old English -ere Middle English -ere English -er English holder English placeholder From place + holder.

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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.