Word.ws English Dictionary

save face

save face verb: to take an action or make a gesture intended to preserve one's reputation or honour.

Verb

save face (third-person singular simple present saves face, present participle saving face, simple past and past participle saved face)

  1. (idiomatic, intransitive) To take an action or make a gesture intended to preserve one's reputation or honour.
    • He tried to make reparations to those he had injured, partly to save face.

save face meaning in Kannada, Arabic, Malay and Persian

save face in Kannada

ಮಾತನ್ನು ಉಳಿಸಿಕೊ, ಒಳ್ಳೆಯ ಹೆಸರು ಕಾಪಾಡಿಕೊ, ಮರ್ಯಾದೆ ಉಳಿಸು, ಗೌರವವನ್ನು ಕಾಪಾಡಿಕೊಳ್ಳು

save face in Arabic

preserve reputation
حَفِظَ مَاءَ الوَجْهِ ḥafiẓa māʔa l-wajhi

save face in Malay

preserve reputation
jaga air muka

save face in Persian

preserve reputation
آبروداری کردن
More languagesFewer languages
save face in Thai
ไว้หน้า wái-nâa, รักษาหน้า rák-sǎa-nâa
save face in Vietnamese
giữ thể diện

Forms of save face

third-person singular presentsaves face
present participlesaving face
past participlesaved face
pastsaved face

Origin of save face

See lose face.

Questions about save face

What does save face mean?
Save face means to take an action or make a gesture intended to preserve one's reputation or honour.
What is save face in Kannada?
Save face in Kannada is ಮಾತನ್ನು ಉಳಿಸಿಕೊ, ಒಳ್ಳೆಯ ಹೆಸರು ಕಾಪಾಡಿಕೊ, ಮರ್ಯಾದೆ ಉಳಿಸು. See Save face meaning in Kannada.
What part of speech is save face?
Save face is a verb.
What is the past tense of save face?
The past tense of save face is saved face.

Words near save face in the dictionary

  1. save appearances
  2. save as
  3. save back
  4. save by the bell
  5. save down
  6. save face
  7. save file
  8. save files
  9. save for
  10. save for a rainy day
  11. save harmless

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: save face (page history and authors); save face (Kannada Wiktionary) (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:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-save face.wav.

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