Tightness

noun

noun ·2 syllables ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The quality or degree of being tight. countable, uncountable

    "The preference for tightness during intercourse is so well known in Western culture that U.S. obstetricians even have a term for the extra stitch they often perform when doing episiotomy repairs following childbirth: the "husband's stitch." The husband's stitch is intended to produce a smaller vaginal opening, to counteract the natural stretching of the tissues from sexual activity and childbirth and even to make the opening more constricted than it might have been before."

  2. 2
    lack of movement or room for movement wordnet
  3. 3
    extreme stinginess wordnet
  4. 4
    the spatial property of being crowded together wordnet
  5. 5
    a tight feeling in some part of the body wordnet
Show 1 more definition
  1. 6
    a state occasioned by scarcity of money and a shortage of credit wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
stringencyadhesivenessalienapartheidavaricebullheadedness

Example

More examples

"I felt an uncomfortable tightness in my chest."

Etymology

From tight + -ness.

Related phrases

chest tightness

More for "tightness"

SynonymsSentencesPronunciationTranslate

Next best steps

Find stronger synonymsSee usage examplesCheck pronunciationBrowse writing guides

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