sneaky
/ˈsniːki/
sneaky adjective: elusive; difficult to capture or observe due to constantly outwitting the adversaries.
Adjective
sneaky (comparative sneakier, superlative sneakiest)
- Elusive; difficult to capture or observe due to constantly outwitting the adversaries.
- Catching those thieves will be hard: they're so sneaky!
- Be sneaky. Fish frighten easily.1995 April, Jeff Csatari, “Tackle Tips”, in Boys' Life, volume 85, number 4, Irving, Texas: Boy Scouts of America, Inc., →ISSN, page 42
- Dishonest; deceitful.
- They played a sneaky trick on us.
- A contribution to a wall newspaper of which I was an editor in our sector poked fun at the never-changing menu in the school cafeteria. It centred on the various and devious methods used in serving us hamburger. One time it would be called hamburger, another time bifshtek, then cutlet, and...1988, Peter Hunter, “Back to School: Dealing with Dissent”, in Which Side Are You On, Boys: Canadian Life on the Left, Toronto, Ont.: Lugus Productions Ltd., →ISBN, page 96
Noun
sneaky (plural sneakies)
- Any device used for covert surveillance.
- […] in cooperation with the National Security Agency, installs and maintains "sneakies" throughout the U.S.S.R. and Communist China — but increasingly, denied areas are surveyed more simply.1974, Miles Copeland, Without cloak or dagger: the truth about the new espionage, page 244
- […] has used travellers to plant 'sneakies' - small electronic transmitting devices which form part of a surveillance network.1991, Chapman Pincher, The Truth about Dirty Tricks
sneaky meaning in Hindi, Marathi, Urdu and Bengali
sneaky in Hindi
- स्नीकी
sneaky in Marathi
- स्नीकी
sneaky in Urdu
- دھوکا دینے والا
sneaky in Bengali
- ধূর্ত, চতুর, অসাধু
More languagesFewer languages
- sneaky in Telugu
- స్నీకీ
- sneaky in Malayalam
- പതുങ്ങിനടക്കുന്ന, സൂത്രശാലിയായ, ഉപായമുള്ള, തന്ത്രമായ
- sneaky in Kannada
- ಸ್ನೀಕಿ
- sneaky in Gujarati
- સ્નીકી
- sneaky in Nepali
- स्नीकी
Examples of sneaky in a sentence
- I got nickel and dimed to death by the phone company's sneaky extra charges.
- It’s a sneaky trend where businesses reduce product quality or offer less value without changing the price.
- If Lachemi was hiding somewhere it’d be in Ryerson’s equivalent of a sneaky labyrinth: Kerr Hall.
Synonyms of sneaky
Forms of sneaky
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | sneakier |
| superlative | sneakiest |
| Noun | |
| plural | sneakies |
Origin of sneaky
From sneak + -y.
Words formed from sneaky
Phrases with sneaky
Words that rhyme with sneaky
Questions about sneaky
- What does sneaky mean?
- Sneaky means elusive; difficult to capture or observe due to constantly outwitting the adversaries.
- What is sneaky in Hindi?
- Sneaky in Hindi is स्नीकी. See Sneaky meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is sneaky?
- Sneaky can be an adjective or a noun.
- How do you pronounce sneaky?
- Sneaky is pronounced /ˈsniːki/.
Words near sneaky in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: sneaky (page history and authors); sneaky (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sneaky (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sneaky (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); sneaky (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); sneaky (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sneaky (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); sneaky (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sneaky (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sneaky (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model 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.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-sneaky.ogg.
Cite this entry: “sneaky.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sneaky. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.