red tape

noun

: official routine or procedure marked by excessive complexity which results in delay or inaction

bureaucratic red tape

… enterprisers that show how people across the Nation are coping (or not coping) with such problems as unemployment, the budget deficit and Government red tape.

—John Weisman

… pompous officials (often lowly clerks) in love with red tape who delight in obstructing the expedition of what should be simple procedures.

—Norman W. Schur

Initial plans became irretrievably mired in the red tape of building permissions.

—Bella Pollen

Their plan is simple enough and none too glamorous: create a Web site to help people cut through red tape; i.e., pay for parking tickets and so on.

—Sarah Kerr

Examples of red tape in a Sentence

You would not believe the red tape involved in getting the required permits.

Recent Examples on the Web

It was tasked with streamlining processes and cutting red tape, as Newsweek reported. —Boston Herald Editorial Staff, Boston Herald, 25 Feb. 2025

View Comments Following the footsteps of her fashion forefathers is also difficult because of high costs and red tape. —Leah Dolan, CNN, 22 Feb. 2025

Today's Department of Homeland Security personnel action will result in roughly $50 million in savings for American taxpayers and incalculable value toward accountability and cutting red tape. —Newsweek, 21 Feb. 2025

City planners said the framework will cut red tape for developers and increase housing density, hopefully allowing more residents to move into the transit-rich corridor, where the CTA will soon complete its $2.1 billion Red-Purple Line modernization project. —Chicago Tribune, 21 Feb. 2025

Word History

Etymology

from the red tape formerly used to bind legal documents in England

First Known Use

1736, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for red tape

• agape
• escape
• landscape
• lenape
• reshape
• seascape
• soundscape
• ape
• cape
• crape
• crepe
• drape

Kids Definition

red tape

noun

: rules and regulations that waste people's time