Word.ws English Dictionary

cop the needle

cop the needle verb: to grow annoyed.

Verb

cop the needle (third-person singular simple present cops the needle, present participle copping the needle, simple past and past participle copped the needle)

  1. (UK, slang) To grow annoyed.
    • It must have been the way I said it because he copped the needle and sneered, 'I haven't got to talk to you about fuck-all. Whatever I do is none of your Goddamn business.'1999, Roy Shaw with Kate Kray, “Nick-Knack-Paddy-Whack”, in Pretty Boy, London: Blake Publishing Ltd, →ISBN, page 82

Forms of cop the needle

third-person singular presentcops the needle
present participlecopping the needle
past participlecopped the needle
pastcopped the needle

Questions about cop the needle

What does cop the needle mean?
Cop the needle means to grow annoyed.
What part of speech is cop the needle?
Cop the needle is a verb.
What is the past tense of cop the needle?
The past tense of cop the needle is copped the needle.

Words near cop the needle in the dictionary

  1. cop onto
  2. cop out
  3. cop shop
  4. cop shops
  5. cop the bun
  6. cop the needle
  7. cop wise
  8. cop-call
  9. cop-called
  10. cop-caller
  11. cop-callers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cop the needle (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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