Word.ws English Dictionary

guai lan

US/(ˈ)ɡwaɪ ˈlɑn/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Singapore[ˈk˭waɪ˦˨ lɑn˨]

guai lan adjective: hard to please or satisfy; irritating, loathsome.

Adjective

guai lan (comparative more guai lan, superlative most guai lan)

  1. (Singlish, colloquial, informal) Hard to please or satisfy; irritating, loathsome.
    • I'd say it's the "kwai lan" (gangster) look.1999 May 23, “The Loanshark Look”, in The New Paper, Singapore
    • you so guai lan for wat2003 July 21, Z-Bone, “Triple X Carsticker”, in Google Groups

Forms of guai lan

comparativemore guai lan
superlativemost guai lan
alternative formkwai lan

Origin of guai lan

Derived from Hokkien 怪𡳞 (koài-lān, literally “strange dick”).

Questions about guai lan

What does guai lan mean?
Guai lan means hard to please or satisfy; irritating, loathsome.
What part of speech is guai lan?
Guai lan is an adjective.
How do you pronounce guai lan?
Guai lan is pronounced [ˈk˭waɪ˦˨ lɑn˨] (Singapore).

Words near guai lan in the dictionary

  1. guaguanche
  2. guaguanches
  3. guaguanco
  4. guaguancos
  5. Guahibo
  6. guai lan
  7. guaiabero
  8. guaiaberos
  9. guaiac
  10. guaiacan
  11. guaiacans

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: guai lan (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: “guai lan.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/guai_lan. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.