switcheroo
/ˌswɪt͡ʃəˈɹuː/
switcheroo noun: a sneaky, unexpected, or clever swap or exchange.
Noun
switcheroo (plural switcheroos)
- A sneaky, unexpected, or clever swap or exchange.
- In a corporate merger, it is usually the big company that buys a smaller one. Last week Boston's up & coming Tracerlab, Inc. pulled a switcheroo. Tracerlab, which grossed only $1,700,000 last year, bought the much bigger ($8,000,000 gross) Kelley-Koett Mfg. Co.1951 April 30, “Business & Finance: Switcheroo”, in Time, archived from the original on 29 Sep 2012
- When you are dealing with American presidents, you always have to watch for the old switcheroo. Lyndon Johnson opposed Barry Goldwater's "extremism" on Vietnam, then proceeded to try to bomb Hanoi back into the stone age. Richard Nixon opposed price and wage controls, until he suddenly adopted them.1977 April 18, Don McGillivray, “Carter, true to form, pulls the ‘switcheroo’”, in Montreal Gazette, retrieved 27 Jul 2012, page 22
Verb
switcheroo (third-person singular simple present switcheroos, present participle switcherooing, simple past and past participle switcherooed)
- To swap or exchange surreptitiously.
- Another day, the magic wind came and switcherooed Katie into a hairdresser named Sparkle.2013, Nancy Krulik, All's Fair, Penguin, →ISBN
Examples of switcheroo in a sentence
- Elsewhere, it’s a ‘switcheroo’ ([Kevin] Kelly’s word, not mine) that will lend technology the working status of a vital force that, like ‘nature’, operates outside the reach of social imperatives.1997, J. J. King, “The Right Connections: Tea with Kevin Kelly”, in Mute, volume 1, number 8, →ISSN:
- The Manhattan Theater Club has pulled a switcheroo, delaying a planned production of Gone Home, by John Corwin, and replacing it with Four, by the 26-year-old playwright Christopher Shinn.2001 December 21, Jesse McKinley, “On Stage and Off”, in New York Times, retrieved 27 Jul 2012:
Forms of switcheroo
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | switcheroos |
| alternative form | switcharoo |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | switcheroos |
| present participle | switcherooing |
| past participle | switcherooed |
| past | switcherooed |
Origin of switcheroo
From switch + -eroo.
Words that rhyme with switcheroo
Questions about switcheroo
- What does switcheroo mean?
- Switcheroo means a sneaky, unexpected, or clever swap or exchange.
- How do you use switcheroo in a sentence?
- Elsewhere, it’s a ‘switcheroo’ ([Kevin] Kelly’s word, not mine) that will lend technology the working status of a vital force that, like ‘nature’, operates outside the reach of social imperatives.
- What part of speech is switcheroo?
- Switcheroo can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce switcheroo?
- Switcheroo is pronounced /ˌswɪt͡ʃəˈɹuː/.
- What is the plural of switcheroo?
- The plural of switcheroo is switcheroos.
Words near switcheroo in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: switcheroo (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.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “switcheroo.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/switcheroo. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.