Primary
''snide'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260609164652-00-⌔
snide - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
English
Adjective
snide (comparative snider, superlative snidest)
- Disparaging or derisive in an insinuative way.
- ✤ Don’t make snide remarks to me.
- ✤ You write your snide bullshit from a dark room because that’s what the angry do nowadays. I was nice to you, don’t torture me for it.1
- Tricky; deceptive; false; spurious; contemptible.
- ✤ Have nothing to do with snide goods; let it be known throughout the world that the farmers and dairymen, yea, and those engaged in other industries in the great State of Illinois, produce only the best of everything in their lines, and we will be the last to feel the effects of over-production.2
- ✤ I knew without studying them that the rings and the watch were snide, and the jewel a paste one; but they were damn fine counterfeits.3
Noun
snide (countable and uncountable, plural snides)
- (countable) An underhanded, tricky person given to sharp practice; a sharper; a cheat.
- (uncountable) Counterfeit money.
Etymology
Probably from a dialectal variant of snithe (“sharp, cutting, cold”).4 See snithe (adjective).
Alternatively, possibly a metathetic corruption of Middle English snythand (“piercing (the heart), cold, biting”, literally and figuratively). More at snithe (verb).
Compare typologically cutting, Russian ко́лкий (kólkij) (akin to коло́ть (kolótʹ)).
Pronunciation
- IPA: /snaɪd/
- Audio (US): 🔊
- Rhymes: -aɪd
Printed 2026-06-28.
(echo:: @ ⌗)
Link to original Footnotes
2010, Aaron Sorkin, The Social Network, spoken by Erica Albright (Rooney Mara): ↩
1890, Illinois State Dairymen’s Association, Annual Report (volume 16, page 21) ↩
2002, Sarah Waters, chapter 1, in Fingersmith, London: Virago, →ISBN, part 1, page 19: ↩
Whitney, The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia, “snide”. ↩
Secondary
• • •