empty suit

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Meaning · English

A person with a title or position but lacking real authority or substance

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

người có chức vụ hoặc vị trí nhưng thiếu thực quyền hoặc nội dung

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Literally: a suit of clothes with no person inside
Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

The new CEO was just an empty suit, making decisions based on what his advisors told him

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

Sources & notes

Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-30; pending editor spot-check.

Common questions

What does “empty suit” mean?

A person with a title or position but lacking real authority or substance Literally: a suit of clothes with no person inside

Is “empty suit” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.