Word.ws English Dictionary

niggling

niggling is the present participle and gerund of niggle.

Adjective

niggling

  1. Petty
    • My dear Hooker, I am getting very much amused by my tendrils, it is just the sort of niggling work which suits me, and takes up no time and rather rests me whilst writing.1863, Charles Darwin's letter to J. D. Hooker, 14th of July 1863
  2. Irritating.
    • Sellafield hasn’t suffered an accident of equivalent scale since the 1957 fire, but the niggling fear that some radioactivity is leaking out of the facility in some fashion has never entirely vanishedDecember 15 2022, Samanth Subramanian, “Dismantling Sellafield: the epic task of shutting down a nuclear site”, in The Guardian

Meaning of niggle

Verb

niggle (third-person singular simple present niggles, present participle niggling, simple past and past participle niggled)

  1. (obsolete, transitive) To trifle with; to deceive; to mock.
    • I shall so feed your fierce vexation , And raise your worship ' s storms ; I shall so niggle you , And juggle you , and fiddle you , and firk youc. 1621, John Fletcher, Philip Massinger, “The Pilgrim”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC, (please specify the...
  2. (transitive) To use, spend, or do in a petty or trifling manner.
  3. (intransitive) To dwell too much on minor points or on trifling details.
  4. (UK, intransitive) To fidget, fiddle, be restless.
  5. (UK, archaic, dialectal, intransitive) To walk with short steps.
    • I can see him now with his one eye closed as he came niggling along, and didn't he just give me a grandfather's blessing!1893, Fores's Sporting Notes & Sketches, page 177

See all 7 meanings of niggle

Noun

niggling (plural nigglings)

  1. A small irritating sensation.
    • Occasionally a paranoia or slight insecurity that is not based on reality will bring nigglings of that bad time.2009, Jenny Parratt, Feelings of Change: Stories of Having a Baby, page 10

Forms of niggling

pluralnigglings

Words formed from niggling

Questions about niggling

What does niggling mean?
Niggling means petty.
What is niggling the present participle and gerund of?
Niggling is the present participle and gerund of niggle.
What part of speech is niggling?
Niggling can be an adjective or a noun.

Words near niggling in the dictionary

  1. nigglet
  2. nigglets
  3. niggliest
  4. niggliite
  5. niggliness
  6. niggling
  7. nigglingly
  8. nigglings
  9. niggly
  10. niggress
  11. niggresses

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: niggling (page history and authors); niggle (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: “niggling.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/niggling. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.