Log in or Sign up
  1. insidious love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. adj. Working or spreading harmfully in a subtle or stealthy manner: insidious rumors; an insidious disease.
  2. adj. Intended to entrap; treacherous: insidious misinformation.
  3. adj. Beguiling but harmful; alluring: insidious pleasures.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. Lying in wait; hence, deceitful; sly; treacherous.
  2. Designed or adapted to entrap; deceptive; insnaring: as, insidious arts.

Wiktionary

  1. adj. Producing harm in a stealthy, often gradual, manner.
  2. adj. Intending to entrap; alluring but harmful.
  3. adj. nonstandard Treacherous.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. adj. Lying in wait; watching an opportunity to insnare or entrap; deceitful; sly; treacherous; -- said of persons.
  2. adj. Intended to entrap; characterized by treachery and deceit.
  3. adj. Acting or proceeding unobserved or in a seemingly harmless manner, but slowly or eventually doing great damage.

WordNet 3.0

  1. adj. beguiling but harmful
  2. adj. intended to entrap
  3. adj. working or spreading in a hidden and usually injurious way

Etymologies

  1. From Latin īnsidiōsus ("cunning, artful, deceitful"), from īnsidiae ("a lying in wait, an ambush, artifice, stratagem") + -ōsus, from īnsideō ("to sit in or on"), from in ("in, on") + sedeō ("to sit"). (Wiktionary)
  2. From Latin īnsidiōsus, from īnsidiae, ambush, from īnsidēre, to sit upon, lie in wait for : in-, in, on; see in-2 + sedēre, to sit; see sed- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

Show 10 more examples...

Log in or sign up to add your own related words.

synonyms (10)

Words with the same meaning

  1. treacherous
  2. deceitful
  1. guileful
  2. sly
  1. circumventive
  2. designing
  1. wily
  2. crafty
  1. deceptive
  2. artful

equivalents (4)

Other words for ‘insidious’

  1. seductive
  1. dangerous
  1. unsafe
  1. harmful

same context (15)

Words that are found in similar contexts

  1. subtle
  2. treacherous
  3. pernicious
  1. seductive
  2. malignant
  3. malicious
  1. irresistible
  2. deceitful
  3. artful
  1. persistent
  2. destructive
  3. devious
  1. crafty
  2. vile
  3. stealthy

rhymes (3)

Words with the same terminal sound

  1. fastidious
  1. hideous
  1. invidious

reverse dictionary (31)

Words that contain this word in their definition

  1. insidious
  2. sap
  3. cobweb
  4. captious
  5. wile
  6. wily
  1. worm-eat
  2. mining
  3. obsta principiis
  4. designing
  5. inroad
  6. insidiation
  1. insidiously
  2. insidiousness
  3. snary
  4. perniciously
  5. subtle
  6. beignet
  1. siren
  2. artful
  3. deep
  4. guile
  5. intriguing
  6. Jesuit
  1. manipulation
  2. mine
  3. mouse
  4. sly
  5. steal
  6. work
  1. worm

tags (2)

Free-form, user-generated categorization

  1. fun to say
  1. SATWOTD

Log in or sign up to add your own tag.

tagging (1)

Words tagged ‘insidious’

  1. incidious

Wordmap

(beta)

Word visualization

Lists

These user-created lists contain the word ‘insidious’.

More lists containing ‘insidious’

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • jwjarvis Our research has shown that multitasking can have an insidious effect on learning. Jun 9, 2010

  • Michelle Scott-Wilson Men are so insidious!! Women, can I get an Amen!! Mar 13, 2010

Tweets

Looking for tweets for insidious.

‘insidious’ has been looked up 7201 times, loved by 29 people, added to 137 lists, commented on 2 times, and has a Scrabble score of 10.