contactless

contactless adjective: conducted without human-to-human contact to improve ease of use or reduce the potential spread of a contagious disease; contact-free.

Adjective

contactless (not comparable)

(usually, exchange) Conducted without human-to-human contact to improve ease of use or reduce the potential spread of a contagious disease; contact-free.
- Contactless commerce, of which Amazon Go is at the extreme end, was of course already by the autumn of 2019 a growing trend, what with increasing numbers of self-checkout counters and websites and apps that allowed us to have everything from groceries to pet supplies to prescription medication...2020, Noreena Hertz, chapter 5, in The Lonely Century, Hodder & Stoughton, →ISBN
- Please stay in touch with me / In this contactless society / Anywhere that you may be2025, “The Hymn of the North”, in Jarvis Cocker (lyrics), More, performed by Pulp
Happening without physical contact at the point of sale.
- TfL has been saying for a few years that Oyster will eventually be withdrawn, but not until contactless payments can offer railcard discounts.2019 October 23, Barry Doe, Rail, page 64
That has no contact or contacts.

Noun

contactless (uncountable)

A technology for paying for goods etc. while physically present at the point of interaction but without the need for physical contact.
- The motivation for using contactless is clear: it is most popular for people in a rush (58 per cent), people with a queue behind them (30 per cent) and those in busy places with lots of people (26 per cent).2012, Graham Flower, Phil Fawcett, Stuart Harle, Banking: In Search of Relevance: A New Model for a New Reality, page 183
- Even before the coronavirus struck, contactless was starting to become our way of life, our active choice.2020, Noreena Hertz, chapter 1, in The Lonely Century, Hodder & Stoughton, →ISBN

Examples of contactless in a sentence

You can check in and check out with a contactless debit card or credit card.
From January 2, passengers will be able to use contactless pay-as-you-go between London and Reading.
Smith warns: "You must not lose sight of the fact that not everyone can do contactless payment and mobile ticketing.

All 10 example sentences with contactless

Origin of contactless

From contact + -less.

Words formed from contactless

Phrases with contactless

contactless cards

Questions about contactless

What does contactless mean?: Contactless means conducted without human-to-human contact to improve ease of use or reduce the potential spread of a contagious disease; contact-free.
What part of speech is contactless?: Contactless can be an adjective or a noun.

Words near contactless in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: contactless (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “contactless.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/contactless. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.