Word.ws English Dictionary

onychophagist

UK/ɒnɪˈkɒfəd͡ʒɪst//ɑnəˈkɑfəd͡ʒɪst/

onychophagist noun: a person who bites his or her fingernails.

Noun

onychophagist (plural onychophagists)

  1. (rare) A person who bites his or her fingernails.

Forms of onychophagist

pluralonychophagists

Origin of onychophagist

From onychophagy + -ist = onycho- + -phag(y) + -ist, from Ancient Greek ὀνυχο- (onuch), combining form of ὄνυξ (ónux, “claw, nail”) + -φαγος (-phagos, “eater”), from ἐφαγόν (ephagón, “I ate”).

Questions about onychophagist

What does onychophagist mean?
Onychophagist means a person who bites his or her fingernails.
What part of speech is onychophagist?
Onychophagist is a noun.
How do you pronounce onychophagist?
Onychophagist is pronounced /ɒnɪˈkɒfəd͡ʒɪst/ (UK).
What is the plural of onychophagist?
The plural of onychophagist is onychophagists.

Words near onychophagist in the dictionary

  1. onychopathic
  2. onychopathies
  3. onychopathology
  4. onychopathy
  5. onychophagia
  6. onychophagist
  7. onychophagists
  8. onychophagy
  9. onychophoran
  10. onychophorans
  11. onychopod

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: onychophagist (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-onychophagist.ogg.

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