Word.ws English Dictionary

idle threats

idle threats is the plural of idle threat.

Meaning of idle threat

Noun

idle threat (plural idle threats)

  1. A threat made by a person who does not mean to carry it out, and which perhaps shouldn't be taken seriously by others.
    • Without any injection of money, Transport for London has said the project could be mothballed. This may not be an idle threat, given the future decline expected in London and South East commuting.2020 December 2, Industry Insider, “The costs of cutting carbon”, in Rail, page 76

Questions about idle threats

What is idle threats the plural of?
Idle threats is the plural of idle threat.

Words near idle threats in the dictionary

  1. idle hands are the devil's playthings
  2. idle hands are the devil's tools
  3. idle hands are the devil's workshop
  4. idle hands make work for the devil
  5. idle threat
  6. idle threats
  7. idle time
  8. idle times
  9. idle wheel
  10. idle wheels
  11. idleby

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: idle threats (page history and authors); idle threat (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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