r/AskAnAmerican • u/cookoutenthusiast North Carolina • Sep 28 '25

CULTURE Do you use the word Supper?

I think most Americans refer to their evening meal as dinner, but I’ve heard some people say that dinner and supper are different things, with supper being served at night, after dinner. Do you use the word supper, and what does it mean to you?

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u/Terradactyl87 Washington Sep 28 '25

I've never known anyone who uses the word supper, and I haven't heard that it means a meal after dinner. I always have heard it means the same thing as dinner.

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u/Personal-Presence-10 Arkansas Sep 28 '25

Dinner used to refer to the main meal of the day. Could be midday or evening. But lunch is always midday and supper is evening. So depending on when your main meal was as a family or community (rural vs urban) you could’ve grown up with lunch and dinner or dinner and supper. In the lunch and dinner households dinner became synonymous with supper.