Word.ws English Dictionary

friend-in-law

friend-in-law noun: a friend by association rather than choice, such as the friend of a partner, spouse or other friend; an acquaintance.

Noun

friend-in-law (plural friends-in-law)

  1. (humorous) A friend by association rather than choice, such as the friend of a partner, spouse or other friend; an acquaintance.

Forms of friend-in-law

pluralfriends-in-law

Origin of friend-in-law

From friend + -in-law, by analogy with mother-in-law, father-in-law, sister-in-law, brother-in-law, etc.

Questions about friend-in-law

What does friend-in-law mean?
Friend-in-law means a friend by association rather than choice, such as the friend of a partner, spouse or other friend; an acquaintance.
What part of speech is friend-in-law?
Friend-in-law is a noun.
What is the plural of friend-in-law?
The plural of friend-in-law is friends-in-law.

Words near friend-in-law in the dictionary

  1. friend zonees
  2. friend zones
  3. friend zoning
  4. friend-boy
  5. friend-boys
  6. friend-in-law
  7. friend-o
  8. friend-os
  9. friend-shaped
  10. friend-to-friend
  11. friend-zone

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: friend-in-law (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: “friend-in-law.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/friend-in-law. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.