What does "tile" mean?

1. (building material) a flat, hard piece of clay, stone, or plastic used to cover a floor, wall, or roof. 2. (game piece) a small, flat piece used in games like Scrabble, dominoes, or mahjong. 3. (computing) a square or rectangular icon on a computer screen that shows information. 4. (to arrange windows) to arrange windows on a computer screen so they sit next to each other without overlapping.

tile

n. · v.

US //ˈtaɪɫ// UK //tˈaɪl// tile

1 building material (n.)
A2 Elementary

a flat, hard piece of clay, stone, or plastic used to cover a floor, wall, or roof.

a thin, usually rectangular or square slab of hard-wearing material used for covering surfaces.

Example

We chose a dark blue tile for the bathroom floor because it is easy to clean.

Example

The restoration project required hand-painted ceramic tiles to match the original nineteenth-century patterns in the hallway.
2 game piece (n.)
B1 Intermediate

a small, flat piece used in games like Scrabble, dominoes, or mahjong.

a small, flat, usually cuboid piece used as a marker or playing component in various board games.

Example

He picked up a letter tile and placed it on the board to win the game.

Example

In mahjong, players must carefully track which tiles have been discarded to predict their opponents' strategies.

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3 computing (n.)
B2 Upper Intermediate Computing

a square or rectangular icon on a computer screen that shows information.

a rectangular graphical user interface element, often used to represent an application or a live data feed.

Example

You can pin a tile to your start menu to see the weather forecast quickly.

Example

The operating system's interface features live tiles that update in real-time with notifications from social media and email accounts.
- icon
- block
4 to arrange windows (v.)
B2 Upper Intermediate Computing

to arrange windows on a computer screen so they sit next to each other without overlapping.

to arrange open windows or images in a grid pattern so that they are all visible simultaneously without overlap.

Example

If you tile your open windows, you can see both documents at the same time.

Example

The software allows users to tile multiple video feeds across the monitor for more efficient security surveillance.
- grid
- align
- cascade
- overlap

Etymology 1

From Middle English tile, tyle, tigel, tiȝel, teȝele, from Old English tieġle, tiġle, tiġele (“tile, brick”), from Proto-West Germanic tigulā (“tile, brick”), from Proto-Germanic tigulǭ (“tile, brick”), from Latin tēgula. Doublet of tegula. Cognates Cognate with Saterland Frisian Tichel (“tile”), West Frisian teil, tegel, tichel (“tile”), Dutch tichel, tegel (“tile”), German Ziegel (“brick, roof tile”), Danish tegl (“brick”), Faroese tigul, Icelandic tigl (“tile, brick”), Norwegian tegl (“brick, roof tile”), Swedish tegel (“brick, tile”), Asturian and Leonese teya (“roof tile”), Aragonese and Galician tella (“roof tile”), Catalan teula (“roof tile”), French tuile (“roof tile”), Italian tegola (“roof tile”), Mirandese teilha (“roof tile”), Portuguese telha (“roof tile”), Spanish teja (“roof tile”), Czech cihla (“brick”), Polish cegła (“brick”).

Etymology 2

See tiler (“doorkeeper at a Masonic lodge”).