Word.ws English Dictionary

topheavy

topheavy is the alternative spelling of top-heavy.

Meaning of top-heavy

Adjective

top-heavy (comparative more top-heavy, superlative most top-heavy)

  1. having a high centre of gravity, and liable to topple
    • Legion: Your new platform is inefficient. It has low-volume hydraulics and is top-heavy.2012, BioWare, Mass Effect 3 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Normandy SR-2
  2. having an excessive number of administrators or managers
  3. Having a significant portion of the plan assets allocated to key employees to the detriment of lower-wage employees.
    • A defined benefit plan is top-heavy if[…] the present value of the accrued benefits (PVAB) under the plan for the key employees exceeds 60 percent of the PVAB under the plan for all employees.2017 September 10, IRS, “4.72.5 Top-Heavy Plans”, in Internal Revenue Service
  4. (typically a woman) having a disproportionately large upper body, especially the bust
    • "My figure is topheavy, and I always thought a woman with a large bust had to look mature. Now I know better." An all-in-one girdle is a lifesaver for women like Miss B.1941, “Fashion”, in Good Housekeeping, volume 112, page 52
  5. (slang) Drunk.
    • He who confines his drink to the same level as that of the poor unreasoning soul-less animals, who never take too much and are never “top-heavy,” cannot avoid irritation.1886, “A field-day among the city guardians”, in Punch, volume 90, page 61

Forms of topheavy

comparativemore topheavy
superlativemost topheavy

Words formed from topheavy

Questions about topheavy

What is topheavy the alternative spelling of?
Topheavy is the alternative spelling of top-heavy.

Words near topheavy in the dictionary

  1. tophats
  2. tophatted
  3. tophe
  4. topheavily
  5. topheaviness
  6. topheavy
  7. Topher
  8. tophet
  9. Tophetic
  10. tophets
  11. tophi

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: topheavy (page history and authors); top-heavy (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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Cite this entry: “topheavy.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/topheavy. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.