guest of honour

• guest of honor

guest of honour (plural guests of honour)

1. (British spelling) A guest in whose honour a gathering is held; the most important guest.
   • 1947 May and June, “Notes and News: The Bristol Railway Circle”, in Railway Magazine, page 184:

     The guest of honour was Mr. John F. Peckett, Jnr., of the well-known Bristol firm of locomotive engineers.

   • 2023 November 15, Tessa Wong, “Xi Jinping arrives in US as his Chinese Dream sputters”, in BBC‎^[1]:

     The BBC understands he will be the guest of honour at a ritzy dinner on Wednesday night organised especially for him to meet top corporate executives.

• “guest of honour”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.