paper tiger
paper tiger noun: something or someone that appears powerful, strong or threatening but is in reality weak, ineffective, or unable to withstand challenge.
Noun
paper tiger (plural paper tigers)
- Something or someone that appears powerful, strong or threatening but is in reality weak, ineffective, or unable to withstand challenge.
- The League of Nations was by this time scarcely even a paper tiger, devoid of credibility since its divisions and pusillanimity had been so clearly laid bare following Mussolini's invasion of Abyssinia in the autumn of 1935.2008 August 23, Ian Kershaw, “The twisted road to war”, in The Guardian, archived from the original on 05 Jun 2023
- Iran is a paper tiger, a postmodern threat: It has many uses but a third Western war against a Muslim country is a bridge too far.2010 October 11, Roger Cohen, “Iran, the Paper Tiger”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 11 Feb 2021
- Synonyms:
- sheep in wolf's clothing
- Antonyms:
- wolf in sheep's clothing
paper tiger meaning in Tagalog, Malay, Indonesian and Thai
paper tiger in Tagalog
- paper tiger
- tigreng papel
paper tiger in Malay
- paper tiger
- harimau kertas
paper tiger in Indonesian
- paper tiger
- harimau kertas
paper tiger in Thai
- paper tiger
- เสือกระดาษ sʉ̌ʉa-grà-dàat
Synonyms of paper tiger
Antonyms
Forms of paper tiger
| plural | paper tigers |
|---|
Origin of paper tiger
A calque from Chinese 紙老虎／纸老虎 (zhǐlǎohǔ), a phrase popularized by Mao Zedong, but of pre-modern origin. An English translation first appeared in an book in 1828 by British missionary and lexicographer Robert Morrison.
Questions about paper tiger
- What does paper tiger mean?
- Paper tiger means something or someone that appears powerful, strong or threatening but is in reality weak, ineffective, or unable to withstand challenge.
- What is paper tiger in Tagalog?
- Paper tiger in Tagalog is tigreng papel. See Paper tiger meaning in Tagalog.
- What part of speech is paper tiger?
- Paper tiger is a noun.
- What is the plural of paper tiger?
- The plural of paper tiger is paper tigers.
Words near paper tiger in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: paper tiger (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-au-paper tiger.ogg.
Cite this entry: “paper tiger.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/paper_tiger. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.