sugarcoat the pill
sugarcoat the pill verb: to make an unpleasant event less displeasing.
Verb
sugarcoat the pill (third-person singular simple present sugarcoats the pill, present participle sugarcoating the pill, simple past and past participle sugarcoated the pill)
- To make an unpleasant event less displeasing.
- Near-synonyms: polish a turd, put lipstick on a pig, sweeten the pot
- To sugarcoat the pill of payment the receiver of the tax was wont to refer to it disparagingly in the diminutive, calling it “la huchette,” “the little tax on a fish stall.”1930, Watson White, The Paris that is Paris, page 186
Synonyms of sugarcoat the pill
Forms of sugarcoat the pill
| third-person singular present | sugarcoats the pill |
|---|---|
| present participle | sugarcoating the pill |
| past participle | sugarcoated the pill |
| past | sugarcoated the pill |
| alternative form | sugarcoat a bitter pill |
Questions about sugarcoat the pill
- What does sugarcoat the pill mean?
- Sugarcoat the pill means to make an unpleasant event less displeasing.
- What part of speech is sugarcoat the pill?
- Sugarcoat the pill is a verb.
- What is the past tense of sugarcoat the pill?
- The past tense of sugarcoat the pill is sugarcoated the pill.
Words near sugarcoat the pill in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: sugarcoat the pill (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-sugarcoat the pill.ogg.
Cite this entry: “sugarcoat the pill.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sugarcoat_the_pill. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.