tender

Fetched 2026-10-28 (live).

Synonyms: render, bender, fender, tinder, gender, vender, ender, sender, tenner, tenter, lender

Antonyms: render, bender, fender, tinder, gender, vender, ender, sender, tenner, tenter, lender

Related words from Datamuse; suggestions, not definitions.

Adjective

1. Sensitive or painful to the touch.
2. Easily bruised or injured; not firm or hard; delicate.
   • tender plants
   • tender flesh
   • tender fruit
3. Physically weak; not able to endure hardship.
4. Soft and easily chewed.
5. Sensible to impression and pain; easily pained.
6. Fond, loving, gentle, or sweet.
   • Suzanne was such a tender mother to her children.
7. Young and inexperienced.
   • I first had a girlfriend at the tender age of seven.
8. Adapted to excite feeling or sympathy; expressive of the softer passions; pathetic.
   • tender expressions; tender expostulations; a tender strain
9. Apt to give pain; causing grief or pain; delicate.
   • a tender subject
10. Heeling over too easily when under sail; said of a vessel.
11. Exciting kind concern; dear; precious.
12. Careful to keep inviolate, or not to injure; used with of.

Noun

1. Care, kind concern, regard.
2. The inner flight muscle (pectoralis minor) of poultry.

Adverb

1. tenderly

Verb

1. To make tender or delicate; to weaken.
2. To feel tenderly towards; to regard fondly or with consideration.

Noun

1. A specialized rail wagon hauled behind a steam engine to carry fuel and water.
2. A naval ship that functions as a mobile base for other ships.
   • submarine tender
   • destroyer tender
3. A smaller boat used for transportation between a large ship and the shore.
4. A member of a diving team who assists a diver during a dive but does not themselves go underwater.
5. Ellipsis of water tender (“firefighting apparatus”).
6. Someone who tends or waits on something or someone.

Verb

1. To work on a tender.

Noun

1. Anything which is offered, proffered, put forth or bid with the expectation of a response, answer, or reply.
   • You offer me the sword of my father, the very man whose bones, because of your perfidy, lie under the sod of Crecy. Aye, I'll surely take it, and just as surely you shall die with your tender through your heart!
2. A means of payment such as a check or cheque, cash or credit card.
   • Your credit card has been declined so you need to provide some other tender such as cash.
   • legal tender
3. A formal offer to buy or sell something.
   • We will submit our tender to you within the week.
4. Any offer or proposal made for acceptance.

Verb

1. To offer, to give.
   • to tender one’s resignation
2. To offer a payment, as at sales or auctions; to bid.

Source: Wiktionary · CC BY-SA 3.0 (Wiktionary) · cached copy, not a rewrite.