Word.ws English Dictionary

wiseguy

wiseguy is the alternative spelling of wise guy.

Meaning of wise guy

Noun

wise guy (plural wise guys)

  1. (derogatory, humorous, informal, mildly, sarcastic) One who is insolent or flippant; one who makes jokes or perpetrates pranks.
    • Her reputation for being a wise guy made her new teachers hesitant about having her in their classes.
  2. (slang) A knowledgeable or successful sports bettor.
  3. (US, slang) A member of the Mafia; a mobster.
    Synonyms:
    Mafioso
  4. (slang) A hipster.
  5. (ethnic, offensive, slang, slur) An Italian-American man.

Forms of wiseguy

pluralwiseguys

Origin of wiseguy

From wise + guy.

Questions about wiseguy

What is wiseguy the alternative spelling of?
Wiseguy is the alternative spelling of wise guy.

Words near wiseguy in the dictionary

  1. wised off
  2. wised up
  3. wisedom
  4. wisedome
  5. wisedomes
  6. wiseguy
  7. wiseguys
  8. Wisehart
  9. Wiseharts
  10. wisehead
  11. wiseheads

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: wiseguy (page history and authors); wise guy (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-wiseguy.ogg.

Cite this entry: “wiseguy.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/wiseguy. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.