Word.ws English Dictionary

cheat

/ˈt͡ʃiːt/

cheat verb: to violate rules in order to gain, or attempt to gain, advantage from a situation.

Verb

cheat (third-person singular simple present cheats, present participle cheating, simple past and past participle cheated)

  1. (intransitive) To violate rules in order to gain, or attempt to gain, advantage from a situation.
    • My brother flunked biology because he cheated on his mid-term.
  2. (intransitive) To be unfaithful to one's spouse or partner; to commit adultery, or to engage in sexual or romantic conduct with a person other than one's partner in contravention of the rules of society or agreement in the relationship.
    • My husband cheated on me with his secretary.
    • After he found out his wife cheated, he left her.
    Synonyms:
    step out on
  3. (transitive) To avoid a seemingly inevitable thing.
    • He cheated death when his car collided with a moving train.
    • I feel as if I've cheated fate.
  4. (transitive) To deceive; to fool; to trick.
    • My ex-wife cheated me out of $40,000.
    • He cheated his way into office.
    Synonyms:
    rook, blench, lirt, burn, beguile
  5. (informal, intransitive) To disregard self-imposed restrictions or commitments in favour of resting or indulging oneself.

Noun (1)

cheat (countable and uncountable, plural cheats)

  1. (countable) An act of deception or fraud; that which is the means of fraud or deception.
    • When I consider life, 'tis all a cheat.1675, John Dryden, Aureng-zebe: A Tragedy. […], London: […] T[homas] N[ewcomb] for Henry Herringman, […], published 1676, →OCLC, (please specify the page number)
  2. (countable) Someone who cheats.
    • And he smote Corinius on his shaven jowl with the dice box, calling him cheat and mangy rascal, whereupon Corinius drew forth a bodkin to smite him in the neck withal; but some went betwixt them, and with much ado and much struggling and cursing they were parted, and it being shown that the dice...1922, E[ric] R[ücker] Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros: A Romance, London: Jonathan Cape […], →OCLC, page 33
    • The caseworker couldn't understand how I could have stretched out my last bit of money for so long. She seemed convinced that I was "hiding" income from her and interrogated me for I don't know how long […] The system seems based on the assumption that people are "welfare cheats. If you don't speak...1990 February 4, Margy Dowzer, Mary Frances Platt, Aviva Shmuckler, “Disability And Accessibility Cost Money!”, in Gay Community News, volume 17, number 29, page 13
    Synonyms:
    cheater, bandit
  3. (uncountable) The weed cheatgrass.
  4. (uncountable) Synonym of bullshit (“a card game where the goal is to have no cards remaining in a hand, often by telling lies”).
    Synonyms:
    bullshit
  5. (countable) A hidden means of gaining an unfair advantage in a video game, often by entering a cheat code.
    • I've had a number of requests for a cheat for Turrican the first. Yes, there is a keypress built in […]1992 January, Phil Howard, “Cheat Mode”, in Amstrad Action, number 76, page 32
    • Unpause the game, then repause the game and enter any of the following cheats: […]1998, GamePro Issue 109 August 1998, page 141

Noun (2)

cheat (uncountable)

  1. (obsolete) A sort of low-quality bread.
    • The raueled cheat therfore is generallie ſo made that out of one buſhell of meale, after two and twentie pounds of bran be ſifted and taken from it (wherevnto they ad the gurgeons that riſe from the manchet) they make thirtie cast, euerie lofe weighing eightéene ounces into the ouen and ſixteene...1587, Raphaell Holinshed, Iohn Hooker, “Of the food and diet of the Engliſh”, in The firſt and ſecond volumes of Chronicles […] , volume I, London: Henry Denham, page 169
    • Takes part with them, at ſhore: their pureſt cheat, / Thrice boulted, kneaded, and ſubdu'd in paſt[…]c. 1624, Homer, translated by George Chapman, The crowne of all Homers workes Batrachomyomachia […] , Iohn Bill, page 3

cheat meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

cheat in Hindi

violate rules to gain advantage
छलना chalnā
to deceive
छलना chalnā

cheat in Tamil

to deceive
ஏமாற்று ēmāṟṟu

cheat in Marathi

फसवणूक करण्यासाठी

cheat in Urdu

cheat, rig; rigger
دھاندل dhāndal
More languagesFewer languages
cheat in Bengali
জোচ্চর jōccor
cheat in Telugu
ఆషాఢభూతి āṣāḍhabhūti, వంచించు vañciñcu, అటమటకాడు aṭamaṭakāḍu, ధూర్తుడు dhūrtuḍu
cheat in Malayalam
വഞ്ചിക്കുക vañcikkuka, പറ്റിക്കുക paṟṟikkuka, ചതിക്കുക catikkuka, വഞ്ചന vañcana
cheat in Kannada
ಎಡ್ಡ, ಆಳಿಗ, ಟಕ್ಕ, ಟಕ್ಕಿಗ
cheat in Punjabi
ਠੱਗ ṭhagga, ਠੱਗਣਾ ṭhaggaṇā
cheat in Gujarati
છેતરપિંડી કરવા માટે
cheat in Odia
ଠକିବା ṭhakibā
cheat in Sanskrit
गर्धयते gardhayate
cheat in Assamese
ঠগ thog, ভাঁৰ bhãr
cheat in Nepali
छक्याउनु chakyāunu
cheat in Pashto
سینه sanh
cheat in Arabic
غَشَّ ḡašša
cheat in Malay
curang
cheat in Indonesian
selingkuh
cheat in Thai
โกง goong, นอกใจ nâawk-jai
cheat in Vietnamese
gian lận, bịp, xập xí xập ngầu, bắt cá hai tay

Examples of cheat in a sentence

  • I am subject to a tyrant, a sorcerer, that by his cunning hath cheated me of this island.1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First...
  • The gig ended with Rotten uttering the now famous line, “Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?” On January 17, the Sex Pistols split up.2018, Peter Smith, quoting Johnny Rotten, Sex Pistols: The Pride of Punk, Rowman & Littlefield, →ISBN, page xxvi:
  • She seemed convinced that I was "hiding" income from her and interrogated me for I don't know how long […] The system seems based on the assumption that people are "welfare cheats.1990 February 4, Margy Dowzer, Mary Frances Platt, Aviva Shmuckler, “Disability And Accessibility Cost Money!”, in Gay Community News...
  • Where by the way note, that loaves made of pure Wheaten Meal require both more Leaven and more labouring, and more baking than either coarſe Cheat or than Bread Mingled of Meal and Grudgins.1746, Thomas Moffett, Christopher Bennet, Health's Improvement […] , London: T. Oſborne, page 339:

All 40 example sentences with cheat

Synonyms of cheat

3 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of cheat

Forms of cheat

Verb
third-person singular presentcheats
present participlecheating
past participlecheated
pastcheated
Noun
pluralcheats

Past tense of cheat: cheated

Plural of cheat: cheats

Origin of cheat

Verb from Middle English achetan, variant of escheten, from Old French escheat, past participle of escheoir, escheoiter, from Late Latin *excadēre (“fall away, fall out”), from (Latin) ex- + cadere (“fall”). Displaced native Old English beswīcan. Noun from verb and/or Middle English chete, aphetic form of achete, escheat, eschete (“the reversion of property to the state”), from Anglo-Norman eschete and Old French eschet, escheit, escheoit (“that which falls to one”), past participle of escheoir (“to fall”) (modern French échoir), from Late Latin *excadēre (“fall away, fall out”), from (Latin) ex- + cadere (“fall”). Doublet of escheat.

Inherited from Middle English chet (“low-quality bread”), of unknown origin; compare manchet.

Words formed from cheat

Phrases with cheat

Words that rhyme with cheat

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about cheat

What does cheat mean?
Cheat means to violate rules in order to gain, or attempt to gain, advantage from a situation.
What is cheat in Hindi?
Cheat in Hindi is छलना (chalnā). See Cheat meaning in Hindi.
How do you use cheat in a sentence?
I am subject to a tyrant, a sorcerer, that by his cunning hath cheated me of this island.
What part of speech is cheat?
Cheat can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce cheat?
Cheat is pronounced /ˈt͡ʃiːt/.
What is the past tense of cheat?
The past tense of cheat is cheated.

Words near cheat in the dictionary

  1. chearing
  2. chears
  3. Cheas
  4. Cheaster
  5. Cheasters
  6. cheat
  7. cheat code
  8. cheat codes
  9. cheat curl
  10. cheat curls
  11. cheat day

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cheat (page history and authors); cheat (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); دھاندل (Urdu) (page history and authors); জোচ্চর (Bengali) (page history and authors); అటమటకాడు (Telugu) (page history and authors); കളിപ്പിക്കുക (Malayalam) (page history and authors); cheat (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਠੱਗ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); cheat (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ଠକିବା (Odia) (page history and authors). 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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Cite this entry: “cheat.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cheat. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.