spy

/spaɪ/

spy noun: a person who secretly watches and examines the actions of other individuals or organizations and gathers information on them (usually to gain an advantage).

Noun

spy (plural spies)

A person who secretly watches and examines the actions of other individuals or organizations and gathers information on them (usually to gain an advantage).
- The dead leap at the throat, destroy
  The meaning of the day; dark forms
  Have scaled your walls, and spies betray
  Old secrets to amorphous swarms.1941, Theodore Roethke, “Feud”, in Open House, New York, N.Y.: Alfred A[braham] Knopf, →OCLC; republished in The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke, London: Faber and Faber […], 1968, →OCLC, page 4
- Even without hovering drones, a lurking assassin, a thumping score and a denouement, the real-life story of Edward Snowden, a rogue spy on the run, could be straight out of the cinema. But, as with Hollywood, the subplots and exotic locations may distract from the real message: America’s discomfort...2013 June 29, “Travels and travails”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8842, page 55
Synonyms:

espy, intelligencer
A defensive player assigned to cover an offensive backfield player man-to-man when they are expected to engage in a running play, but the offensive player does not run with the ball immediately.

Verb

spy (third-person singular simple present spies, present participle spying, simple past and past participle spied)

(intransitive) To act as a spy.
- During the Cold War, Russia and America would each spy on each other for recon.
(transitive) To spot; to catch sight of; to espy.
- I think I can spy that hot guy coming over here.
- VVherefore lift up your heads, brethren, and look about vvith your eyes, ſpy vvhat things are to be reformed in the Church of England.1536 June 15 (Gregorian calendar), Hugh Latimer, “Sermon II. Master Latimer’s Discourse on the Same Day in the Afternoon [Preached to the Convocation of the Clergy, before the Parliament Began, the...
(intransitive) To search narrowly; to scrutinize.
- (As I confeſſe it is my Natures plague / To ſpy into Abuſes, and of my iealouſie / Shapes faults that are not)c. 1603–1604 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Othello, the Moore of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...
(transitive) To explore; to see; to view; inspect and examine secretly, as a country.

spy meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

spy in Hindi

person who secretly watches: जासूस jāsūs, गुप्तचर guptacar

spy in Marathi

person who secretly watches: हेर her, गुप्तहेर guptaher
to act as a spy: हेरगिरी करणे hergirī karṇe

spy in Urdu

person who secretly watches: جاسُوس jāsūs

More languagesFewer languages

spy in Bengali: গুপ্তচর guptocor
spy in Telugu: వేగు vēgu, గూఢచారి gūḍhacāri
spy in Malayalam: ചാരൻ cāraṉ
spy in Kannada: ಎಕ್ಕಟಿಗ, ಎಕ್ಕಡಿಗ, ಹೊಂಚುಗಾರ, ಬೇಹುಗಾರ
spy in Punjabi: ਖਬਰਗੀਰ khabragīr, ਜਸੂਸ jasūs
spy in Gujarati: જાસૂસ jāsūs
spy in Odia: ଗୁପ୍ତଚର guptacara
spy in Sanskrit: स्पश् spáś, चर cara
spy in Assamese: চোৰাংচোৱা süraṅsüa
spy in Nepali: जासुसी, जासुसी गर्न, जासुस गर्न
spy in Pashto: جاسوس jāsús
spy in Tagalog: batyaw
spy in Arabic: جَاسُوس jāsūs, تَجَسَّسَ tajassasa
spy in Malay: pengintip, intip
spy in Indonesian: mata-mata, memata-matai
spy in Thai: สายลับ sǎai-láp, จารชน jāa-rá-chōn
spy in Vietnamese: gián điệp
spy in Myanmar: သူလျှို suhlyui
Dhivehi: ޖާސޫސް jāsūs

Examples of spy in a sentence

Once he'd spied out my weaknesses, he'd know how to apply pressure.
The spy made the drop, leaving the plans under the tree as arranged.
Those perverts were trying to spy on us while we changed clothes!

All 40 example sentences with spy

Synonyms of spy

All synonyms of spy

Forms of spy

Noun
plural	spies
Verb
third-person singular present	spies
present participle	spying
past participle	spied
past	spied

Past tense of spy: spied

Plural of spy: spies

Origin of spy

From Middle English spien, aphetic variant of earlier espien (“to espy”), from Old French espier (“to spy”), from Frankish *spehōn (“to spy”), from Proto-Germanic *spehōną (“to see, look”), from Proto-Indo-European *speḱ- (“to look”). Akin to German spähen (“to spy”), Dutch spieden (“to spy”). The noun displaced native Old English sċēawere (literally “watcher”), which was also the word for "mirror." In this sense, the verb displaced Old English sċēawian, which was also the word for "to watch" and became the Modern English word show. Distant cognate vie PIE with Latin speculātor, Ancient Greek κατάσκοπος (katáskopos). Compare typologically Russian согляда́тай (sogljadátaj) (akin to гляде́ть (gljadétʹ)).

Words formed from spy

Phrases with spy

Words that rhyme with spy

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about spy

What does spy mean?: Spy means a person who secretly watches and examines the actions of other individuals or organizations and gathers information on them (usually to gain an advantage).
What is spy in Hindi?: Spy in Hindi is जासूस (jāsūs), गुप्तचर (guptacar). See Spy meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is spy?: Spy can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce spy?: Spy is pronounced /spaɪ/.
What is the plural of spy?: The plural of spy is spies.

Words near spy in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: spy (page history and authors); spy (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); spy (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); चर (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); spy (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.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-spy.ogg.

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