What does "platitude" mean?

An often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse.

What is a synonym for "platitude"?

Common synonyms include: bromide, abstraction, adage, apophthegm, apothegm, banality.

Pronounced //ˈplatɪˌtjuːd//.

//ˈplatɪˌtjuːd// noun

noun ·Moderate ·College level

Noun

1
An often-quoted saying that is supposed to be meaningful but has become unoriginal or hackneyed through overuse. countable
"Beauty, I suppose, opens the heart, extends the consciousness. It is a platitude, of course."
2
a trite or obvious remark wordnet
3
A claim that is trivially true, to the point of being uninteresting. countable
"The synthesis which he helped to effect was so successful that this aspect of his work escaped notice in the last century: all that Britomart stands for was platitude to our fathers. It is platitude no longer."
4
Flatness; lack of change, activity, or deviation. uncountable
"The former figures the typical prairie landscape-poet who stops at the correction line (which itself literally denies the platitude of flatness) to notice the ever-present wind."
5
Unoriginality; triteness. uncountable
"seemly platitude, flat-footed ordinariness, and well-enacted upper working class respectability cancel out any turpitude, exhilarating tension or satanic glamour a casino might be expected to have."

"That is not just a platitude. I really mean it."

Borrowed from French platitude, from plat (“flat”).

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.