tippy

/ˈtɪpi/

tippy adjective: fashionable, tip-top.

Adjective (1)

tippy (comparative tippier, superlative tippiest)

(colloquial, obsolete, slang) Fashionable, tip-top.
- Of all the gay beaux, / That sport their smart cloathes, / There's none that my fancy can please, / With their Spencers or Crops, / Or woolly Foretops, / Like Bob with his Tippy Bootees.1806, Kitty Crotchet, “The Bootees—A New Song”, in The Port Folio, volume 2, Philadelphia: John Watts, page 76
Synonyms:

a la mode, trendy, a la mode/à la mode, all the rage, chic, sassy, cool, dapper, done, elegant
(colloquial, slang) Clever, neat, smart.
- She read Renan's Vie de Jésus, and I am now going to lend her the antidote—a tippy little bit of criticism by Pressensé.1863, [1910], Early Letters of Marcus Dods, D.D., page 344
Of tea, having a large amount of tips, or leaf buds.
- Before rolling some planters are in the habit of sifting the leaf through a No. 4 sieve, and manufacturing the small leaf and tips that fall through separately. This will add to the appearance of the tea, by making it more tippy, but unless fancy teas are being made will not pay for the time and...1886, T.C. Owen, The Tea Planter's Manual, Colombo: A.M. & J. Ferguson, pages 49–50

tippy (plural tippies)

(colloquial, obsolete, slang) A dandy.
- Is his dreſs, as we may preſume it will be, elegant; exhibiting no articles of apparel but ſuch as are “All the rage?” he is “Quite the tippy.”1798, “Whimſical Peculiarities of Expreſſion”, in The Monthly Magazine and British Register, v 6, London: R. Phillips, p 173
Synonyms:

cockscomb, fop, barbermonger, beau, blade, blood, buck, carpet knight, dandy, dike
(absolute, colloquial, obsolete, slang) Something at the height of fashion, excellent, cool.
- I underſtand, however, that there is a diſtinction between theſe names in the city and St. James's; in the latter place you may find faſhion in the characters of the ton, the taſte, the etiquette, &c. in the city they are all the tippy, the thing, the ſort, &c. and pretty things they are, Heaven...1802, “Ladies Literature”, in New England Quarterly Magazine, volume 2, Boston, page 225
- The wig's the thing, the wig, the wig, / Be of the ton a natty sprig, / The thing, the tippy and the twig, / Nor heed who are the truly wise, / For after all, in vulgar eyes, / The wisdom's in the wig.1806, The Port Folio, volume 2, Philadelphia: John Watts, page 143

tippy (comparative tippier, superlative tippiest)

This will add to the appearance of the tea, by making it more tippy, but unless fancy teas are being made will not pay for the time and trouble incurred.1886, T.C. Owen, The Tea Planter's Manual, Colombo: A.M. & J. Ferguson, pages 49–50:
Nabob's servants be the tippy—Every thing be done by them so genteely.1808, Thomas Morton, “A Cure for the Heart Ache”, in The British Theatre; or, A Collection of Plays, London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and...
“Just the tippy, for I was cleaned out. […]”1845, “The Frog and the Fox”, in The New Monthly Magazine and Humorist, London: Henry Colburn, page 371:

30 more synonymsFewer synonyms

1790, tip (“apex”) + -y (diminutive). Sense of “clever” may be influenced by tip (“inside information”).

1886, tip (“knock over”) + -y.

What does tippy mean?: Tippy means fashionable, tip-top.
How do you use tippy in a sentence?: This will add to the appearance of the tea, by making it more tippy, but unless fancy teas are being made will not pay for the time and trouble incurred.
What part of speech is tippy?: Tippy can be an adjective or a noun.
How do you pronounce tippy?: Tippy is pronounced /ˈtɪpi/.

Adapted from Wiktionary: tippy (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

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-tippy.ogg.

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