wonkier

Adjective (1)

wonky (comparative wonkier, superlative wonkiest)

1. Lopsided, misaligned or off-centre.
   • Who's this gimp with a wonky eye / I don't know but his lips are dry2016 April 2, “Afghan Business (Afghan Dan Send)”, performed by Dylan Brewer and Little T (Josh Tate)

   Synonyms:

   awry, misaligned, skew-whiff

2. (Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, UK) Feeble, shaky or rickety.
   • It seemed likely that he would need First Aid when those wonky steps yielded, at length, to the well-known law of gravitation.1932, Frank Richards, The Magnet: The Terror of the Form

   Synonyms:

   rickety

3. (informal) Suffering from intermittent bugs.

   Synonyms:

   buggy, broken

4. (informal) Generally incorrect.
   • “It’s the ‘societal value’ part this looks wonky to me,” Mr. [Lee] McIntyre said in an email to The Times.2026 May 19, Benjamin Mullin, quoting Lee McIntyre, “Book on Truth in the Age of A.I. Contains Quotes Made Up by A.I.”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

Adjective (2)

wonky (comparative wonkier, superlative wonkiest)

1. Technically worded, in the style of jargon.
   • Climate change is an issue that might lend itself more easily to thematic framing in the news, due to the often highly technical and wonky language required to explain it.2009, Jesse Dale Holcomb, Faith, Science and Trust: Climate Change Framing Effects and Conservative Protestant Opinion, archived from the original on 07 Mar 2016
2. Technical in nature, difficult for non-specialists to understand.
   • During the boom times, Paris Hilton, Snoop Dogg, Reese Witherspoon and Matt Damon all gushed about or invested in crypto projects, bringing a mainstream audience to the wonky world of digital currencies.2023 July 6, Erin Griffith, David Yaffe-Bellany, “How Tom Brady’s Crypto Ambitions Collided With Reality”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

See all 7 meanings of wonky