Word.ws English Dictionary

monkey patch

monkey patch noun: a patch which alters the behaviour of a program by forcibly overriding aspects of the original code at runtime.

Noun

monkey patch (plural monkey patches)

  1. (slang) A patch which alters the behaviour of a program by forcibly overriding aspects of the original code at runtime.

Verb

monkey patch (third-person singular simple present monkey patches, present participle monkey patching, simple past and past participle monkey patched)

  1. (slang, transitive) To alter the behaviour of a program by forcibly overriding aspects of the original code at runtime.
    • Even though that works with some browsers, others provide Anchor objects without click() methods. Add this magic code to your application.js, to Monkey Patch a JavaScript click() event:2007, Philip C. Plumlee, Test Driven Ajax (on Rails)

Forms of monkey patch

Noun
pluralmonkey patches
alternative formmonkeypatch
alternative formmonkey-patch
Verb
third-person singular presentmonkey patches
present participlemonkey patching
past participlemonkey patched
pastmonkey patched

Origin of monkey patch

Apparently from earlier guerrilla patch (“code that sneakily changes other code”), understood as gorilla patch. A monkey patch was then a more carefully written instance of such a patch. Or simply derived from monkey (“to mess with”, verb).

Questions about monkey patch

What does monkey patch mean?
Monkey patch means a patch which alters the behaviour of a program by forcibly overriding aspects of the original code at runtime.
What part of speech is monkey patch?
Monkey patch can be a noun or a verb.
What is the plural of monkey patch?
The plural of monkey patch is monkey patches.

Words near monkey patch in the dictionary

  1. monkey orchestra
  2. monkey orchestras
  3. monkey orchid
  4. monkey parade
  5. monkey parades
  6. monkey patch
  7. monkey patched
  8. monkey patches
  9. monkey patching
  10. monkey paw
  11. monkey paws

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: monkey patch (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: “monkey patch.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/monkey_patch. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.