Word.ws English Dictionary

scaly

/ˈskeɪli/

scaly adjective: covered or abounding with scales.

scaly: covered or abounding with scales
Image: Boulenger, George Albert, 1858-1937, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Adjective

scaly (comparative scalier, superlative scaliest)

  1. Covered or abounding with scales.
    • a scaly fish a scaly stem
    • If the lids of the eyes become inflamed and scaly, do not seek to remove the scales roughly, for they will bring the lashes with them.1876, Eliza Bisbee Duffey, Our Behaviour: A Manual of Etiquette and Dress of the Best American Society, Philadelphia
  2. Composed of scales lying over each other.
    • a scaly bulb
  3. Resembling scales, laminae, or layers.
    Synonyms:
    leprose
  4. (South Africa, dated, vulgar) low, mean.
    • a scaly fellow
    • This done, he removed the hat; and having touched his forehead lightly with a silk handkerchief, for the afternoon sun was warm, gazed about him with a grave distaste. “A scaly neighbourhood!” he murmured. The young man’s judgment was one at which few people with an eye for beauty would have...1923, P. G. Wodehouse, chapter II, in Leave It to Psmith

Noun

scaly (plural scalies)

  1. (South Africa) The scaly yellowfish (Labeobarbus natalensis).

scaly meaning in Tamil, Malayalam and Arabic

scaly in Tamil

செதிள்களையுடைய, அலகிடு

scaly in Malayalam

squamulose, squamous, squamate
ചെതുമ്പലുള്ള, ശൽക്കങ്ങൾ കൊണ്ട് ആവരണം ചെയ്ത, ശൽക്കങ്ങൾകൊണ്ടു നിർമ്മിച്ച, ചെതുമ്പൽ മൂടിയ
flaky, dry, flaking
വരണ്ട, വരണ്ടുണങ്ങിയ, പാളികളായി പൊളിഞ്ഞുവരുന്ന, ചെതുമ്പൽപോലെ ഇളകിവരുന്ന, പുറംതൊലി പൊളിയുന്ന, പൊറ്റ പൊളിയുന്ന

scaly in Arabic

covered or abounding with scales
مُحَرْشَف muḥaršaf, حَرْشَفِيّ ḥaršafiyy

Examples of scaly in a sentence

  • He suffers from a skin complaint, psoriasis, which has rendered his hands scaly, hard and red.
  • A scaly hand grabbed Gloom's ecto-blaster and pulled it from its holster.
  • Scalies are more prone to be in open grass away from cover.

All 21 example sentences with scaly

Synonyms of scaly

2 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of scaly

Forms of scaly

Adjective
comparativescalier
superlativescaliest
Noun
pluralscalies

Origin of scaly

From Middle English scali, skaly. By surface analysis, scale + -y.

Words formed from scaly

Phrases with scaly

Words that rhyme with scaly

11 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about scaly

What does scaly mean?
Scaly means covered or abounding with scales.
What is scaly in Tamil?
Scaly in Tamil is செதிள்களையுடைய, அலகிடு. See Scaly meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is scaly?
Scaly can be an adjective or a noun.
How do you pronounce scaly?
Scaly is pronounced /ˈskeɪli/.

Words near scaly in the dictionary

  1. scalpriform
  2. scalprum
  3. scalps
  4. scalpy
  5. scals
  6. scaly
  7. scaly anteater
  8. scaly anteaters
  9. scaly clam
  10. scaly clams
  11. scaly legs

Source and license

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

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