Word.ws English Dictionary

in the crosshairs

in the crosshairs prepositional phrase: targeted at the point of intersection of the two perpendicular lines in a gunsight or scope.

Prepositional phrase

  1. (literally) Targeted at the point of intersection of the two perpendicular lines in a gunsight or scope.
  2. (figuratively) Subject to close scrutiny.
    • Industry experts are concerned that if the railway doesn't change tack, it would soon find itself out of step with the needs of the nation and in the crosshairs of a Treasury looking to slash spending.2021 October 20, Ben Jones, “The benefits of (and barriers to) more leisure travel by rail”, in RAIL, number 942, page 32
  3. (figuratively) Singled out for blame, harassment, or other unwanted attention.
    • Nettles lives in the crosshairs, with the secret police, his sympathizers, and his now and would-be lovers making impossible demands on him.1989 November 3, “Brilliant acting, conception drive ‘Largo Desolato’”, in The Advocate, Louisiana, USA, retrieved 27 Oct 2011
    • The German industrial giants that exploited slave labor during the war, from Volkswagen to Krupp, are in the crosshairs of class-action suits from Holocaust survivors.1998 December 2, Frank Rich, “Opinion: What's Good for General Motors . . .”, in New York Times, retrieved 27 Oct 2011

Questions about in the crosshairs

What does in the crosshairs mean?
In the crosshairs means targeted at the point of intersection of the two perpendicular lines in a gunsight or scope.
What part of speech is in the crosshairs?
In the crosshairs is a prepositional phrase.

Words near in the crosshairs in the dictionary

  1. in the clouds
  2. in the club
  3. in the cold light of day
  4. in the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king
  5. in the course of time
  6. in the crosshairs
  7. in the dark
  8. in the distance
  9. in the dock
  10. in the dogbox
  11. in the doghouse

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: in the crosshairs (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-in the crosshairs.ogg.

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