Word.ws English Dictionary

showing one's true colors

showing one's true colors is the present participle and gerund of show one's true colors.

Meaning of show one's true colors

Verb

show one's true colors (third-person singular simple present shows one's true colors, present participle showing one's true colors, simple past showed one's true colors, past participle shown one's true colors or (US also) showed one's true colors)

  1. (idiomatic, informal) To reveal how one really is, as opposed to how one has been portrayed or after having been deceptively and deliberately misleading.

Questions about showing one's true colors

What is showing one's true colors the present participle and gerund of?
Showing one's true colors is the present participle and gerund of show one's true colors.

Words near showing one's true colors in the dictionary

  1. showing one's cards
  2. showing one's claws
  3. showing one's hand
  4. showing one's stuff
  5. showing one's teeth
  6. showing one's true colors
  7. showing one's true stripes
  8. showing one's work
  9. showing oneself
  10. showing out
  11. showing round

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: showing one's true colors (page history and authors); show one's true colors (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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