Word.ws English Dictionary

canary

UK/kəˈnɛəɹi/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

British/kəˈnɛːɹɪj/

canary noun: a small, usually yellow, finch (genus Serinus), a songbird native to the Canary Islands.

canary: a small, usually yellow, finch (genus Serinus), a songbird native to the Canary Islands
Image: Quadell, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

canary (countable and uncountable, plural canaries)

  1. A small, usually yellow, finch (genus Serinus), a songbird native to the Canary Islands.
  2. Any of various small birds of different countries, most of which are largely yellow in colour.
  3. (informal) A female singer, soprano, a coloratura singer.
  4. (slang) An informer or snitch; a squealer.
    Synonyms:
    informant
  5. A light, slightly greenish, yellow colour.
  6. (slang) A (usually yellow) capsule of the short-acting barbiturate pentobarbital/pentobarbitone (nembutal).
  7. (Australia, informal) A yellow sticker applied by the police to a vehicle to indicate it is unroadworthy.
    • The tendency in these types of situations (as far as I can see) is that because I don't think the act itself is illegal, the police will go through your vehicle systematically loking^([sic]) for anything wrong with it, to slap a canary on it (that's slang for an unroadworthy sticker) or present you...1993 September 12, Jacco Zwetsloot, “Warning About Speed Traps”, in alt.folklore.urban (Usenet)
    • Yes, if the exhaust is to noisey^([sic]) they can slap a yellow canary on it, but the[n] who cares you got rid of it.1999 January 16, Garry Lawson, “Noisy Bikes (Update)”, in aus.motorcycles (Usenet)
  8. Any test subject, especially an inadvertent or unwilling one. (From the mining practice of using canaries to detect dangerous gases.)
  9. A value placed in memory such that it will be the first data corrupted by a buffer overflow, allowing the program to identify and recover from it.
  10. A change that is tested by being rolled out first to a subset of machines or users before rolling out to all.
  11. A light, sweet, white wine from the Canary Islands.
    • Ile to my honeſt knight ſir Iohn Falſtaffe, / And drinke Canary with him.c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, […] [T]he Merrie Wiues of Windsor. […] (First Quarto), London: […] T[homas] C[reede] for Arthur Ihonson, […], published 1602, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]
    • And though the annals of the period do not show us that there was less ale drawn, or less canary called for; men got dry with the heat of polemical discussion, and drunk with a text, not the fag end of a ballad, in their mouths; and people made a sort of morality of straight hair, long faces, and...1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XVII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 190
  12. A lively dance, possibly of Spanish origin (also called canaries).
    • In an other corner, Mistris Minx, a marchants wife, that will eate no cherries, forsooth, but when they are at twentie shillings a pound, that lookes as simperingly as if she were besmeard, and iets it as gingerly as if she were dancing the canaries, […]1592, Thomas Nash[e], Pierce Penilesse His Supplication to the Deuill. […], London: […] [John Charlewood for] Richard Ihones, […], →OCLC
    • […] I haue ſeen a medicine / That's able to breath life into a ſtone, / Quicken a rocke, and make you dance Canari / With ſprightly fire and motion, […]c. 1604–1605 (date written), William Shakespeare, “All’s Well, that Ends Well”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
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  1. (UK, obsolete, slang) A sovereign (coin).
  2. (public transport) A previously-issued ticket, retained by a ticket-seller, conductor or driver and resold to a subsequent passenger as a means of defrauding the transport company.
    • She had previously been sacked ... for "selling canaries" - a practice in which drivers resell used tickets to passengers and keep the fare for themselves.2022 October 10, Matthew Backhouse, “Bus driver accused of pocketing fares compensated”, in The New Zealand Herald
  3. (UK, obsolete, slang) A prisoner or convict.

Adjective (1)

canary (comparative more canary, superlative most canary)

  1. Of a light yellow colour.

Verb

canary (third-person singular simple present canaries, present participle canarying, simple past and past participle canaried)

  1. (intransitive) To dance nimbly (as in the canary dance).
    • but to jig off a tune at / the tongue's end, canary to it with your feet,c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
  2. (slang) To inform or snitch, to betray secrets, especially about illegal activities.
    Synonyms:
    rat out
  3. To test a software change by rolling out to a small set of machines or users before making it available to all.

Noun (2) capitalized: Canary

Canary (plural Canaries)

  1. Someone connected with Norwich City Football Club, as a fan, player, coach etc.

Adjective (2) capitalized: Canary

Canary (not comparable)

  1. That can be exercised on quarterly dates, a set time period (usually one year) after the issue date, and before the expiry date.
    • Canary callable bonds are a type of step-up bond that is a hybrid structure, having elements of both Bermudan and European calls.2005, Gary Strumeyer, chapter 9, in Investing in Fixed Income Securities: Understanding the Bond Market, John Wiley & Sons
    • The canary bond is unique in that it is callable during the period before the security converts to a noncallable or bullet structure; the canary callable coupon can possess a step-up feature.2006, Ben Finkelstein, The Politics of Public Fund Investing: How to Modify Wall Street to Fit Main Street, Touchstone, page 123

canary meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

canary in Hindi

कैनरी, केनरी

canary in Tamil

நமது பூமியில் காணப்படும் பறவைகளில், இது ஒரு சிறப்பு இனமாகும்

canary in Marathi

कॅनरी, कॅनरीला

canary in Urdu

کینری, کینیری
More languagesFewer languages
canary in Bengali
ক্যানারি পাখি
canary in Telugu
కానరీ, కానరి, క్యానరీ
canary in Malayalam
മഞ്ഞതൂവലുള്ള ഒരുതരം പാട്ടുപാടുന്ന പക്ഷി
canary in Kannada
ಕ್ಯಾನರಿ, ಕೆನರಿ
canary in Punjabi
ਕੈਨਰੀ, ਕੈਨੈਰੀ
canary in Gujarati
કેનેરી, કેનરી
canary in Odia
କ୍ଯ଼ାନାରୀ, କାନେରୀ
canary in Nepali
क्यानरी, केनरी, क्यानेरी
canary in Tagalog
kanaryo
canary in Arabic
كَنَارِي kanārī
canary in Indonesian
kenari
canary in Thai
นกคีรีบูน nók-kii-rii-buun
canary in Vietnamese
chim tước, chim bạch yến, rượu canary

Examples of canary in a sentence

  • This breed of canary is unflighted for the first six months of its life.
  • I love hearing the song of canary birds.
  • You're dressing up as a canary? Can't you find something with a little more meat on its bones, like an eagle?

All 22 example sentences with canary

Synonyms of canary

Forms of canary

Noun
pluralcanaries
pluralCanaries
Adjective
comparativemore canary
superlativemost canary
Verb
third-person singular presentcanaries
present participlecanarying
past participlecanaried
pastcanaried

Plural of canary: canaries

Origin of canary

From French canarie, from Spanish canario, from the Latin Canariae insulae (“Canary Islands”) (Spanish Islas Canarias); from the largest island Insula Canaria (“Dog Island" or "Canine Island”), named for its dogs, from canārius (“canine”), from canis (“dog”).

From 1907, coined by the football club's then-chairman who was a keen breeder of canaries.

Based on the geography of the Canary Islands, between Bermudan and European.

Words formed from canary

Phrases with canary

6 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with canary

19 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about canary

What does canary mean?
Canary means a small, usually yellow, finch (genus Serinus), a songbird native to the Canary Islands.
What is canary in Hindi?
Canary in Hindi is कैनरी, केनरी. See Canary meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is canary?
Canary can be a noun, an adjective or a verb.
How do you pronounce canary?
Canary is pronounced /kəˈnɛəɹi/ (UK).
What is the plural of canary?
The plural of canary is canaries.

Words near canary in the dictionary

  1. Canarsee
  2. Canarsees
  3. Canarses
  4. Canarsie
  5. Canarsies
  6. canary
  7. canary bird
  8. canary birds
  9. Canary broom
  10. canary creeper
  11. canary creepers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: canary (page history and authors); Canary (page history and authors); canary (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); canary (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); canary (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); canary (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); canary (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-canary.ogg, EN-AU ck1 canary.ogg.

Cite this entry: “canary.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/canary. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.