noun

• The quality or fact of being late; lateness.

  ‘forgive my tardiness, I had some very important business to attend to’

  More example sentences

  • ‘Luckily, the plane was delayed, so their tardiness at Heathrow went unnoticed.’
  • ‘Rigidity in the labour market, wage-induced inflation and tardiness in technological adaptation were the predictable results.’
  • ‘Humiliated by its tardiness in plugging into the Internet boom, Japan is determined not to suffer the same indignity in bioscience.’
  • ‘My tardiness has been heavily influenced by my employment commitments and, as such, was somewhat unavoidable.’
  • ‘I owe a few people email responses but I know I'll be forgiven for my tardiness.’

  Synonyms

  belatedness, unpunctuality, lateness, delay, retardation, dilatoriness

  View synonyms