tickets

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of ticket.

   All the tickets for the concert sold out within an hour.

   She kept the tickets safe in her coat pocket until the show began.

   Note

   A regular plural, made with -s, that covers every kind of ticket: passes to concerts and trains, lottery shares, even a ship's master's certificate. The same spelling is also the verb for issuing a ticket. Position tells them apart. After a number or determiner it counts passes (two tickets, the tickets). After a singular subject it names an action (the warden tickets vehicles).

2. 2
   nouncolloquial

   Used informally to mean a single ticket rather than several.

   When the conductor reached my row, I fumbled for my tickets, a single crumpled stub in my coat pocket.

   He flashed his tickets at the gate and squeezed through the turnstile.

   Similarpass

3. 3
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of ticket.

   The warden tickets vehicles that overstay the meter.

   Each kiosk tickets passengers within a few seconds of payment.

   Note

   The verb behind this form has two jobs: issuing someone a ticket, whether for travel or for breaking a traffic or local law, and marking something with a ticket. Either way it takes a direct object. The person or thing receiving the ticket is that object, never the ticket itself: the warden tickets vehicles, the kiosk tickets passengers. It shares its spelling with the plural noun.

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