tone meaning

• Noun: tone  town
  1. The quality of a person's voice
     "he began in a conversational tone"; "he spoke in a nervous tone of voice"
     -
  Verb: tone  town
  1. Utter monotonously and repetitively and rhythmically
     - chant, intone 
  2. Vary the pitch of one's speech
     - inflect, modulate 
  3. Change the colour or tone of
     "tone a negative" 
  4. Change to a colour image
     "tone a photographic image" 
  5. Give a healthy elasticity to
     "Let's tone our muscles"
     - tone up, strengthen

  Derived forms: tones, toned, toning

  See also: intonate, isotonic, tonal, toner, tonic

  Type of: ambiance, ambience, atmosphere, auditory sensation, color [US], color in [US], coloring [US], colorise [Brit], colorize [US], colour [Brit, Cdn], colour in [Brit, Cdn], colouring [Brit, Cdn], colourise [Brit], colourize [Brit, Cdn], delivery, discolor [US], discolour [Brit, Cdn], exercise, interval, manner of speaking, mouth, musical interval, musical notation, pitch, quality, sound, sound property, speak, speech, talk, tautness, tenseness, tension, tensity, utter, verbalise [Brit], verbalize, work out

  Part of: musical scale, scale

  Encyclopedia: Tone Tone, Gunma Tone, Ibaraki

• 
  [Business]
  AmE / noun [C]

  a sound heard on a telephone line

  : (BrE) the dialling tone

  ◆ (AmE) the dial tone

  Please leave your message after the tone.

  ⇨ STRIKE verb

• 
  [Electronics]
  1. The pitch (frequency) and timbre (relative harmonic content) of a sound other than noise.
  2. A sound consisting of a periodic waveform having constant frequency; also called note.
  
  
  tone arm See PICKUP ARM.
  
• 
  [Medicine]
  n
  1 : a sound of definite pitch and vibration
  2
  a : the state of a living body or of any of its organs or parts in which the functions are healthy and performed with due vigor
  b : normal tension or responsiveness to stimuli; specif : TONUS 2
  ²tone
  vt toned; ton·ing : to impart tone to ‹medicine to tone up the system› ‹tone the muscles›
  

[Computer]
<graphics> (Or "tone", "luminance", "value", "luminosity", "lightness") The coordinate in the HSB colour model that determines the total amount of light in the colour. Zero brightness is black and 100% is white, intermediate values are "light" or "dark" colours.

The other coordinates are hue and saturation.

• tone in:    tone in BrE if som ...
• audible tone:    [Electronics]A vib ...
• beat tone:    [Electronics]A bea ...

Examples

1. on the whole their tone was precise.
2. the tone was neither aggressive nor conciliatory.
3. cordelia imitated his guttural tones.
4. what do you think of our family tone?
5. the question was asked in a tone of surprise.