Word.ws English Dictionary

nitwit

US/ˈnɪtwɪt/

nitwit noun: a scatterbrained or stupid person.

Noun

nitwit (plural nitwits)

  1. (informal) A scatterbrained or stupid person.
    • If you don't remember you are a nitwit. If you do answer, well, you know what the penalty is for perjury.1918, State Bar Association of Connecticut, Annual Report, page 82
    • "Don't be a nitwit, honey!" says Adele. "Here, let me open the door! Ma be I did leave them lights on, though it ain't ike me!"1922, Nina Wilcox Putnam, Laughter Inc

nitwit meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam

nitwit in Tamil

அறிவிலி, முட்டாள்

nitwit in Urdu

احمق, بدھو, کوڑھ مغز

nitwit in Bengali

অল্পবুদ্ধি ব্যক্তি, জড়ধী

nitwit in Malayalam

idiot, fool, ass
ബുദ്ദു, വിഡ്ഢി, മാഴൻ, മൂഢൻ, മുഹേരൻ, ഹുണ്ഡൻ
More languagesFewer languages
nitwit in Kannada
ಹೆಡ್ಡ, ದಡ್ಡ

Forms of nitwit

pluralnitwits

Origin of nitwit

First attested in the 1910s in the US Northeast. Likely from German nit, dialect form of nichts (“nothing”), or Yiddish ניט (nit), dialect form of נישט (nisht, “no”), although some dictionaries give the alternative etymology nit (“louse egg; something very small”) + wit.

Words formed from nitwit

Questions about nitwit

What does nitwit mean?
Nitwit means a scatterbrained or stupid person.
What is nitwit in Tamil?
Nitwit in Tamil is அறிவிலி, முட்டாள். See Nitwit meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is nitwit?
Nitwit is a noun.
How do you pronounce nitwit?
Nitwit is pronounced /ˈnɪtwɪt/ (US).
What is the plural of nitwit?
The plural of nitwit is nitwits.

Words near nitwit in the dictionary

  1. Nittolo
  2. Nittolos
  3. nitty
  4. nitty gritty
  5. nitty-gritty
  6. nitwit
  7. nitwits
  8. nitwitted
  9. nitwittedly
  10. nitwittedness
  11. nitwittery

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: nitwit (page history and authors); nitwit (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); nitwit (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); nitwit (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); nitwit (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); nitwit (Kannada Wiktionary) (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-nitwit.wav.

Cite this entry: “nitwit.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/nitwit. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.