Word.ws English Dictionary

fly on the wall

fly on the wall noun: a quiet, non-participating, or unseen observer; an eavesdropper or witness.

Noun

fly on the wall (plural flies on the wall)

  1. (idiomatic) A quiet, non-participating, or unseen observer; an eavesdropper or witness.
    • James W. Gerard, ex-Ambassador to Germany, the first speaker of the evening, said that at that moment he would like to be a fly on the wall of the palace at Potsdam to hear what the Potsdam gang were saying about our soldiers.1918 August 9, “Clark Would Draft Even Men of 68”, in New York Times, retrieved 28 Oct 2008, page 11
    • I wish I'd been a little fly on his chamber wall when he found out that he had to go through the Michigan Child Custody Act!1979 February 3, Jil Clark, quoting Margareth Miller, “Major Court Decision Allows Lesbian Mother to Retain Custody”, in Gay Community News, volume 6, number 27, page 1

Forms of fly on the wall

pluralflies on the wall

Questions about fly on the wall

What does fly on the wall mean?
Fly on the wall means a quiet, non-participating, or unseen observer; an eavesdropper or witness.
What part of speech is fly on the wall?
Fly on the wall is a noun.
What is the plural of fly on the wall?
The plural of fly on the wall is flies on the wall.

Words near fly on the wall in the dictionary

  1. fly low
  2. fly off
  3. fly off at a tangent
  4. fly off the handle
  5. fly off the shelves
  6. fly on the wall
  7. fly orchid
  8. fly orchids
  9. fly out
  10. fly out of the blocks
  11. fly out of the traps

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: fly on the wall (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-fly on the wall.ogg.

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