Word.ws English Dictionary

try-baby

try-baby noun: a person who makes an attempt without being fully committed to success.

Noun

try-baby (plural try-babies)

  1. (derogatory, informal) A person who makes an attempt without being fully committed to success.
    • Don't be a try-baby, Hank, be a do-baby.1998, Norm Hiscock, "Propane Boom" (King of the Hill TV episode)
    • Don't Be a "Try-Baby"
      If you want to achieve any goal, your first step is to declare it. Take 100 percent responsibility for creating it and then clear out all the words like "hopefully," "can't," "maybe" — and the killer, "try."2009, Matt Morris, The Unemployed Millionaire, page 49

Forms of try-baby

pluraltry-babies

Origin of try-baby

Blend of try + crybaby

Questions about try-baby

What does try-baby mean?
Try-baby means a person who makes an attempt without being fully committed to success.
What part of speech is try-baby?
Try-baby is a noun.
What is the plural of try-baby?
The plural of try-baby is try-babies.

Words near try-baby in the dictionary

  1. try work
  2. try works
  3. try'n'a
  4. try'na
  5. try-babies
  6. try-baby
  7. try-hard
  8. try-hards
  9. try-miter square
  10. try-miter squares
  11. try-off

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: try-baby (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: “try-baby.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/try-baby. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.