Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use scruffy in a sentence

11 example sentences · adjective, noun

Scruffy means untidy in appearance; scrubby; shabby. Example: “A scruffy little dog came scampering down the road.”

Examples of scruffy by meaning

adjectiveUntidy in appearance; scrubby; shabby.

  • A scruffy little dog came scampering down the road.
  • And I will think of my father, sun-baked, scruffy and far from home, stalking the wilds of Clapham Common, saved from a dinner of roasted aesculin by people who knew the importance of making someone feel at home.2025 December 24, Nell Frizzell, “When my father first came to the UK, people bonded and looked after him. Would that happen now?”, in The...

nounAn arctic fox.

  • For quotations using this term, see Citations:scruffy.

More sentences with scruffy

  • I saw that he had improved his manners if not his scruffy appearance.From the entry if not
  • Sometimes it takes a scruffy underdog to show the professionals what's what.2011 August 15, Sonia Van Gilder Cooke, “Sangat TV”, in Time. From the entry what's what
  • There was a healthy crowd: a mix of what looked like well-heeled uptowners, scruffy Brooklyn bohemians and clean-scrubbed Asian art students.2007 January 14, Will Hermes, “Indie Rock’s Patron Saint Inspires a New Flock”, in New York Times. From the entry uptowner
  • That store, by the way, like most else in Mala Noche, is a scruffy den of half-glimpsed scrunge.1994, Donald Lyons, Independent Visions, page 225. From the entry scrunge
  • Because of the folks at Animal Care & Control, we have our scruffy puppers and blocky-headed wigglebutts and chonky floofers, loved and spoiled as any pet should be.2021 November 10, Jen Tota McGivney, “2021 Charlotteans of the Year: CMPD Animal Care & Control”, in Charlotte Magazine, Morris Media…. From the entry floofer
  • He wears the standard checked shirt of the Kiwi bloke over a T-shirt and jeans, his hair is longish and unkempt, and he is generally a bit scruffy.2012, Sue Abel, “Postfeminism Meets Hegemonic Masculinities: Young People Read the ‘Knowing Wink’ in Advertising”, in Karen Ross, editor…. From the entry bloke
  • In a scruffy apartment building down a muddy back alley in the provincial town of Wuxue in Hubei Province, one of China's newest industries is taking off.2006 October 13, Caroline Bailey, “China's full-time computer gamers”, in BBC News, archived from the original on 05 Feb 2007. From the entry Wuxue
  • For decades, kitesurfers and, more recently, their foilboarding descendants have turned up at Crissy Field, a scruffy crescent of sand at the foot of the historic Presidio of San Francisco.2020 September 3, Guy Trebay, “Windjamming in the Bay”, in The New York Times. From the entry foilboard

Meaning of scruffy

  1. adjective Untidy in appearance; scrubby; shabby.
  2. adjective Scurfy.
  3. noun An artificial intelligence researcher who believes that intelligence is too complicated (or computationally intractable) to be solved with the sorts of homogeneous system favoured by the "neats".

Full definition of scruffy

Questions about scruffy in a sentence

How do you use scruffy in a sentence?
Scruffy is used as an adjective and noun. For example: “A scruffy little dog came scampering down the road.”
What is a short sentence with scruffy?
“For quotations using this term, see Citations:scruffy.”
What does scruffy mean?
Scruffy means untidy in appearance; scrubby; shabby.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: scruffy (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use scruffy in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/scruffy. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.