Word.ws English Dictionary

turns a hair

turns a hair is the third-person singular simple present indicative of turn a hair.

Meaning of turn a hair

Verb

turn a hair (third-person singular simple present turns a hair, present participle turning a hair, simple past and past participle turned a hair)

  1. (idiomatic) To show fear, alarm or distress; to be affected (by an experience or situation).
    • If in some hideous dissecting-room or fetid laboratory you found this man lying on a leaden table with red gutters scooped out in it, you would simply look upon him as an admirable subject. You would not turn a hair.1891, Oscar Wilde, “chapter 12”, in The Picture of Dorian Gray, London; New York, N.Y.: Ward Lock & Co., →OCLC

Questions about turns a hair

What is turns a hair the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Turns a hair is the third-person singular simple present indicative of turn a hair.

Words near turns a hair in the dictionary

  1. turnrow
  2. turns
  3. turns a blind eye
  4. turns a corner
  5. turns a deaf ear
  6. turns a hair
  7. turns a number of shades of red
  8. turns a page
  9. turns a phrase
  10. turns a profit
  11. turns a setback into a comeback

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: turns a hair (page history and authors); turn a hair (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: “turns a hair.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/turns_a_hair. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.