Word.ws English Dictionary

ruffle some feathers

ruffle some feathers verb: to cause a disturbance; to arouse resentment, anger, or concern.

ruffle some feathers: to cause a disturbance; to arouse resentment, anger, or concern
Image: Rison Thumboor from Thrissur, India, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Verb

ruffle some feathers (third-person singular simple present ruffles some feathers, present participle ruffling some feathers, simple past and past participle ruffled some feathers)

  1. (figuratively, informal) To cause a disturbance; to arouse resentment, anger, or concern.
    • Any frank discussion of politics is sure to ruffle some feathers.
    • They were all aware that there had lately been some discussion which had ruffled the feathers of the aristocracy […] He had, indeed, no wish to ruffle the feathers of gentlemen who might render assistance to them; and if he could stand between the two parties, and make peace, most happy would he be...1849, The Farmer's Magazine

Synonyms of ruffle some feathers

Forms of ruffle some feathers

third-person singular presentruffles some feathers
present participleruffling some feathers
past participleruffled some feathers
pastruffled some feathers
alternative formruffle a few feathers
alternative formruffle feathers
alternative formruffle any feathers

Origin of ruffle some feathers

Evoking the image of roosters, who ruffle their neck feathers when threatened. OED's earliest attestation is from 1829. Perhaps a variant of an earlier phrase "ruffle the tempers", attested since at least 1722.

Questions about ruffle some feathers

What does ruffle some feathers mean?
Ruffle some feathers means to cause a disturbance; to arouse resentment, anger, or concern.
What part of speech is ruffle some feathers?
Ruffle some feathers is a verb.
What is the past tense of ruffle some feathers?
The past tense of ruffle some feathers is ruffled some feathers.

Words near ruffle some feathers in the dictionary

  1. ruffins
  2. ruffle
  3. ruffle a few feathers
  4. ruffle any feathers
  5. ruffle feathers
  6. ruffle some feathers
  7. ruffle someone's feathers
  8. ruffle up
  9. ruffleable
  10. ruffled
  11. ruffled a few feathers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ruffle some feathers (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)-Flame, not lame-ruffle some feathers.wav.

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