Word.ws English Dictionary

look the other way

look the other way verb: to ignore something wrong; to turn a blind eye to something; to connive at something.

Verb

look the other way (third-person singular simple present looks the other way, present participle looking the other way, simple past and past participle looked the other way)

  1. (idiomatic) To ignore something wrong; to turn a blind eye to something; to connive at something.
    • The policeman decided to look the other way when he realized the criminal’s act could benefit him.

Synonyms of look the other way

Forms of look the other way

third-person singular presentlooks the other way
present participlelooking the other way
past participlelooked the other way
pastlooked the other way

Questions about look the other way

What does look the other way mean?
Look the other way means to ignore something wrong; to turn a blind eye to something; to connive at something.
What part of speech is look the other way?
Look the other way is a verb.
What is the past tense of look the other way?
The past tense of look the other way is looked the other way.

Words near look the other way in the dictionary

  1. look right through
  2. look round
  3. look sharp
  4. look shy
  5. look snappy
  6. look the other way
  7. look the part
  8. look through
  9. look through one's fingers
  10. look through rose-colored glasses
  11. look through rose-tinted glasses

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: look the other way (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-look the other way.ogg.

Cite this entry: “look the other way.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/look_the_other_way. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.