get someone's goat
Syllables: get some·one's goatUK/ˌɡɛt ˈsʌmwʌnz ˈɡəʊt//ˌɡɛt ˈsʌmwʌnz ˈɡoʊt/
get someone's goat verb: to annoy or infuriate someone.
Verb
get someone's goat (third-person singular simple present gets someone's goat, present participle getting someone's goat, simple past got someone's goat, past participle (UK) got someone's goat or (US) gotten someone's goat)
- To annoy or infuriate someone.
- It really gets my goat when inconsiderate people drop litter in public.
- If he had legged it on his own account, because what he heard me say got his goat, I could understand that.1915, Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, chapter XXIII, in Uneasy Money, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton and Company, published 17 March 1916, →OCLC, page 306
- Synonyms:
- get someone's nanny, get someone's nanny-goat, get under one's goat, give someone the shits, aggravate, annoy, nettle, rankle, ruffle, sting
Synonyms of get someone's goat
- get someone's nanny
- get someone's nanny-goat
- get under one's goat
- give someone the shits
- aggravate
- annoy
- nettle
- rankle
- ruffle
- sting
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of get someone's goat
| third-person singular present | gets someone's goat |
|---|---|
| present participle | getting someone's goat |
| past | got someone's goat |
| past participle UK | got someone's goat |
| past participle US | gotten someone's goat |
Origin of get someone's goat
Uncertain; it has been suggested that the term may be derived from French prendre la chèvre (literally “to take the goat”), or refer to the stealing of a goat mascot from a military unit, etc.
Words formed from get someone's goat
Questions about get someone's goat
- What does get someone's goat mean?
- Get someone's goat means to annoy or infuriate someone.
- What part of speech is get someone's goat?
- Get someone's goat is a verb.
- How do you pronounce get someone's goat?
- Get someone's goat is pronounced /ˌɡɛt ˈsʌmwʌnz ˈɡəʊt/ (UK).
- What is the past tense of get someone's goat?
- The past tense of get someone's goat is got someone's goat.
Words near get someone's goat in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: get someone's goat (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-get someone's goat.wav.
Cite this entry: “get someone's goat.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/get_someone%27s_goat. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.