twink
/ˈtwɪŋk/
twink verb: to twinkle; to sparkle.
Verb (1)
twink (third-person singular simple present twinks, present participle twinking, simple past and past participle twinked)
Noun (1)
twink (plural twinks)
- One or more very small, short bursts of light.
- […] chug of the fishermen’s boats, twink of lights in the harbor at night […]1921, Almira Bailey, “The Bay on Sunday Morning” in Vignettes of San Francisco, San Francisco: The San Francisco Journal, p. 18
- But even as he went, the smile began to come on his face, caught by the tail of the sturdy sister’s black eye, with its everlasting twink.1934, D. H. Lawrence, “Smile”, in The Woman Who Rode Away and Other Stories, Hamburg: Albatross, page 101
- A very short moment of time.
- […] in a twink she won me to her love.c. 1590–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
- I’d have known all about it in half a twink.1893, Emily Sarah Holt, chapter 15, in All’s Well, London: J.F. Shaw, page 118
- Synonyms:
- instant, twinkling, bat of an eye, bit, blink of an eye, crack, eyeblink, flash, glimpse, half a mo
Noun (2)
twink (plural twinks)
- The chaffinch.
- A sound made by the chaffinch and some other birds.
- The chaffinch 'twinks, twinks!' sets up his topknot, and sings his very best to his mate that is sitting near him. Even the hedge sparrow and the wren sing well, although few would give them credit for it.1889, Charles Peters, The Girl's Own Outdoor Book: Containing Practical Help, page 390
- [page 11:] Integrated movements are accompanied by two calls—the 'twink' which may be uttered in phrases of up to 5 notes, and the 'chich ich ich', similar to the scolding note but less harsh. Often the two calls are combined into a single phrase—'twink twink chich ich ich'. Either may be used at...1952, Robert A. Hinde, The Behaviour of the Great Tit (Parus Major) and Some Other [Birds]
Verb (2)
twink (third-person singular simple present twinks, present participle twinking, simple past and past participle twinked)
Noun (3)
twink (plural twinks)
- A young, attractive, slim man, usually having little body hair.
- “Where are the twinks anyway? They usually have the decency to provide one or two decorative twinks… Jesus, who needs to waste a night staring at these tired old Gucci queens.”1978, Armistead Maupin, “Full moon in Seacliff”, in Tales of the City, New York: Ballantine, pages 253–254
- […]the narrow gay ideal of a slim or waiflike male body, as displayed by the young "twink".2006, Dennis D. Waskul, Phillip Vannini, Body/Embodiment: Symbolic Interaction and the Sociology of the Body, page 135
- A weak or effeminate man, whether gay or not.
- “I thought testosterone would turn me into a man, but it turned me into a twink,” Tom, who is nonbinary, revealed to a cackling West Village audience last week at the Greenwich House Theater in Manhattan.2023 December 14, Gina Cherelus, “The Trans Comic Looking for Love ‘at the End of the World’”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 22 Mar 2024
- Synonyms:
- pretty boy, fairy, bading, big girl's blouse, cockney, cot-quean, cupcake, dudelet, fakaleiti, femboy
- A new recruit.
- But most of the lifers had never seen 'Nam and most of the twinks—the new recruits—had little idea of where they were going […] [page 61:] twinks waiting to be assigned to their units […] [page 94:] loaded aboard a chopper with the day's resupply of twinks to join Charlie Company […]1983, Peter Louis Goldman, Tony Fuller, Charlie Company: What Vietnam Did to Us, page 32
- He was a twink—a recruit—no longer, but a sophomore at least, and, since this was war's campus, accelerating you no end, maybe a junior already.1988, Paul West, The Place in Flowers where Pollen Rests, page 370
- A lower-level character in a roleplaying game (MMO) who is artificially overgeared or overpowered, due to being given advanced equipment or resources via a higher-level character controlled by the same player.
- Bind-on-account was an innovation that allowed players to transfer goods to their own twinks, but not to those of other players.2015, Richard A. Bartle, MMOs from the Inside Out, page 154
- Characters who were obvious twinks, possessing equipment well beyond their means, were subject to public criticism.2016, Timothy Rowlands, Video Game Worlds: Working at Play in the Culture of EverQuest, page 71
- A player in a multi-user dungeon (MUD) who engages in abusive min-maxing behaviour and exploits or took advantage of other players for personal gain.
- I certainly don't consider myself a twink; however it seems that anyone who doesn't agree with another's point of view is automatically labelled as such.1997, Flower of the Night, “Looking for a mud”, in rec.games.mud.diku (Usenet)
- You will not find any stock. You will not find any easy mobs. You will not find any +100 dam 'big swords of I win'. You will not find twink mudders. You will not hear about how Jim the Kewl dOOd scored last night at his sister's birthday party. You will not find bots.1997, Gov't Cheeze, “[AD/REQUEST] Builders and Players (twinks need not apply)”, in rec.games.mud.admin (Usenet)
Verb (3)
twink (third-person singular simple present twinks, present participle twinking, simple past and past participle twinked)
- To engage in obnoxious or abusive behaviour in a multi-user dungeon or other roleplaying game, for example by griefing or by equipping a low-level character with advanced equipment from another player.
- Twinking happens in virtual worlds with PD, but not to the same extent.2004, Richard A. Bartle, Designing Virtual Worlds, page 429
- However, the taboo surrounding twinking had all but disappeared by the time I started playing again in 2004.2016, Timothy Rowlands, Video Game Worlds: Working at Play in the Culture of EverQuest
Noun (4)
twink (uncountable)
Noun (5) capitalized: Twink
Twink
- Synonym of correction fluid.
- Synonyms:
- correction fluid
twink meaning in Tamil and Tagalog
twink in Tamil
- மலார்
twink in Tagalog
- a twinkle; a glint
- sulyap
Examples of twink in a sentence
- […] and once again, in the twink of nothing, I was in another big high cab, all set to go hundreds of miles across the night, and was I happy!1957 September 5, Jack Kerouac, chapter 3, in On the Road, New York, N.Y.: Viking Press, →OCLC, part 1:
- "You heard the man," the guard said, then […] It was bad enough to put him in the stockade, but to treat him like that twink Konieczny . . .1996, David Jauss, Black Maps:
- He used real money to buy large amounts of in-game gold then 'twinked' his new character with the best gear, upgrading as his level rapidly increased.2018, Adam Drake, Shadow For Hire Books 1-4:
- That the twinked little brat doesn't want to mention that the only reason she won a single game was that daddy cut her a fat check.2020, Alex Maven, ForeverQuest: Online Battle Arena:
Synonyms of twink
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Antonyms
Forms of twink
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | twinks |
| present participle | twinking |
| past participle | twinked |
| past | twinked |
| Noun | |
| plural | twinks |
Origin of twink
From Middle English twinken, twynken, from Old English *twincian (“to wink; twinkle”), from Proto-West Germanic *twinkōn, from Proto-Germanic *twinkōną, an augmented form (with formative *-kōną; see English -k) of Proto-Germanic *twint- (“to twinkle”). Cognate with Middle High German zwinken, zwingen, modern German zwinkern (“to wink; twinkle”), Middle Dutch twinc (“a blink”), Middle High German zwinzen, zwinzern (“to blink, blink hard”).
Imitative of the sound.
From twinkie. More at Twink § Etymology on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
Words formed from twink
Phrases with twink
Words that rhyme with twink
Questions about twink
- What does twink mean?
- Twink means to twinkle; to sparkle.
- What is twink in Tamil?
- Twink in Tamil is மலார். See Twink meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use twink in a sentence?
- […] and once again, in the twink of nothing, I was in another big high cab, all set to go hundreds of miles across the night, and was I happy!
- What part of speech is twink?
- Twink can be a verb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce twink?
- Twink is pronounced /ˈtwɪŋk/.
- What is the past tense of twink?
- The past tense of twink is twinked.
Words near twink in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: twink (page history and authors); Twink (page history and authors); twink (Tamil Wiktionary) (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:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-twink.oga, en-au-twink.ogg.
Cite this entry: “twink.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/twink. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.