Meaning & use

frill

noun·Everyday

A decorative strip of gathered fabric used as trim, or, more broadly, an unnecessary extra feature or luxury.

See it in a sentence

The dress had delicate lace frills along the sleeves and hem.

The budget airline offers cheap fares with no frills, not even free snacks.

A note on using this word

The figurative sense is almost always used in the plural, as in no frills or without any frills, to mean without extra luxuries.

Words with a similar meaning

ruffleflounce

Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.

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