admittance

admittance — noun

1. the right or permission to go into a building or other restricted area, often gr

1.nounC1
Definition

the right or permission to go into a building or other restricted area, often granted by an official, a sign, or a person guarding the door.

Example

A red sign on the warehouse door read 'No admittance without a hard hat.'

fixed phrase: 'no admittance' on warning signs

Yael was refused admittance to the club because he was wearing shorts.

passive: be refused / denied admittance

Common collocations
  • no admittance
  • refuse admittance
  • deny admittance
  • gain admittance
  • grant admittance
  • seek admittance
Synonyms
  • entry

    much more common and neutral; works in everyday speech where 'admittance' sounds stiff

  • access

    broader — includes the ability to use something (a website, a road), not just to enter a place

  • admission

    often interchangeable, but 'admission' is preferred for being formally accepted into a school, club, or hospital

Antonyms
  • exclusion

    the formal opposite — being kept out of a place or group

Grammar Patterns

admittance to + place

no admittance

Usage Note

Almost always uncountable and fairly formal; in everyday speech, 'entry' or 'getting in' is far more common. Frequently appears in fixed warning phrases such as 'No admittance' and in passive structures like 'be refused / denied admittance'.

Common Mistakes

I bought two admittances to the show.
I bought two tickets to the show.
admittance is uncountable; you cannot count it. Use 'ticket' or 'entry' for items you buy.
He got an admittance into the building.
He gained admittance to the building.
no article 'an' before this uncountable noun, and the usual preposition is 'to', not 'into'.

Word family

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

All four words concern getting into a place, but they split along formality and scope. 'Admittance' is the most formal and the narrowest: it almost always means the right to physically enter a place, and it is so old-fashioned in everyday talk that you mostly meet it on signs ('No admittance'). 'Admission' overlaps with admittance for entry to events and venues but reaches further — it is the standard word for being accepted into a school, hospital, or organisation, and for the fee you pay at the door ('admission charge'). 'Entry' is the everyday neutral choice for the simple act of going in, with no formality at all ('the entry to the park'). 'Access' is the broadest and most modern: it covers entering a place, but also using a system, road, or service ('internet access', 'wheelchair access'), which the others cannot do.

admittance ↗admission ↗entry ↗access

Common collocations

Nouns

  • admittance fee
  • admittance card

Phrases

  • no admittance
  • refuse admittance
  • deny admittance
  • gain admittance
  • grant admittance
  • seek admittance

Prepositions

  • admittance to

Etymology

LatinOld FrenchEnglish

Admittance came into English in the late 1500s, built from the verb 'admit' plus the noun ending '-ance'. 'Admit' itself goes back, through Old French, to the Latin verb 'admittere', meaning 'to send to' or 'to let in', formed from 'ad-' ('to') and 'mittere' ('to send'). The noun first meant the act of letting someone enter, and from the 1600s it settled into its modern sense of permission or the right to go into a place. A separate technical sense in physics — the reciprocal of electrical impedance — was coined in 1887 by reusing the same word.