variants
or less commonly nonwhite
1
: not of a white race (see race entry 1 sense 1a)
non-white immigrants
non-white Alaskans
2
: not of the color white
… I was standing at the very top of the ladder and stretching to paint over the last non-white spot on the ceiling …—
Xaver Bayer
Xaver Bayer
variants
or less commonly nonwhite
plural non-whites also nonwhites
: a person who is not of a white race (see race entry 1 sense 1a)
Examples of non-white in a Sentence
Noun
The program is even less popular among nonwhites.
Recent Examples on the Web
Mike Hendricks, Kansas City Star, 13 June 2025
Darjeeling doesn’t do right by most of its non-white characters, but in her brief scenes, Karan sketches an intriguing and beguiling woman.
46.
—Joe Reid, Vulture, 12 June 2025
Kyle Paoletta, Harpers Magazine, 29 Mar. 2023
But the lead acts — Bad Bunny, Blackpink, and Frank Ocean — also make history as the first group of 100% non-white Coachella headliners.
—Oscar Hartzog, Rolling Stone, 28 Mar. 2023
See All Example Sentences for non-white
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Adjective
The department’s only non-white fire chief was Ed Wilson, who began his career in the 1940s in one of those segregated fire houses reserved for Black firefighters only and then led the department during the 1980s.
—Mike Hendricks, Kansas City Star, 13 June 2025
Darjeeling doesn’t do right by most of its non-white characters, but in her brief scenes, Karan sketches an intriguing and beguiling woman.
46.
—Joe Reid, Vulture, 12 June 2025
Noun
Share [Findings] Drivers of fancy cars yield to pedestrians less often than drivers of humble cars, and still less if the pedestrians are non-white men.
—Kyle Paoletta, Harpers Magazine, 29 Mar. 2023
But the lead acts — Bad Bunny, Blackpink, and Frank Ocean — also make history as the first group of 100% non-white Coachella headliners.
—Oscar Hartzog, Rolling Stone, 28 Mar. 2023
See All Example Sentences for non-white
Cite this Entry
“Non-white.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/non-white. Accessed 17 Jun. 2025.
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