1
as in cunning
clever at attaining one's ends by indirect and often deceptive means
tried to fix the game with a guileful plot to sabotage the other team's bats, but the umpire caught them
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in deceptive
given to or marked by cheating and deception
received a guileful answer when I asked the dealer if the used car had ever been in a collision
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
Recent Examples of Synonyms for guileful
Adjective
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Michael Douglas — Wall Street (1987) Gordon Gekko is a cunning and unscrupulous corporate predator who crystallized the Reagan-era ethos into three words.—
EW.com,
EW.com,
2 Mar. 2025 -
Gilded by privilege and cunning, Glinda (Ariana Grande) is a popular young woman who desires to wield magic.—
Destiny Jackson,
Deadline,
2 Mar. 2025
Adjective
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False Hope And Fake Assurances Ransomware operators also exploit victims with false assurances, creating a deceptive sense of hope that there is a way to resolve the situation.—
Stu Sjouwerman,
Forbes,
10 Mar. 2025
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That’s the film’s greatest surprise, its secret deceptive pitch.—
Bilge Ebiri,
Vulture,
7 Mar. 2025
Adjective
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This Mainstays set accomplishes both goals and is so cute for summer.—
Megan Schaltegger,
Travel + Leisure,
21 Mar. 2025
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His rapping has a frail, slithering quality; his vocal tone morphs between cute squeakiness and ragged rottweiler growls.—
Spencer Kornhaber,
The Atlantic,
21 Mar. 2025
Adjective
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Multiple users commented on Joann's latest post about fraudulent websites to criticize the chain's decision about gift cards.—
Taylor Ardrey,
USA TODAY,
19 Mar. 2025
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March 6 Check fraud: The City of Saratoga reported that someone attempted to access government funds with fraudulent checks.—
Anne Gelhaus,
The Mercury News,
14 Mar. 2025
Adjective
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Struggling to read greens by consistently missing left or right is aided by digital green readers that retrain your brain to read the subtle undulations of the green.—
BestReviews,
Chicago Tribune,
14 Mar. 2025
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Kennedy’s subversion of vaccines, subtle at times, glaring at others, goes far beyond the measles outbreak.—
Nicholas Florko,
The Atlantic,
14 Mar. 2025
Adjective
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To his supporters, Trump is taking justifiable action over past shady behavior.—
Niall Stanage,
The Hill,
14 Mar. 2025
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Desperate to make clear his intense dissatisfaction with how Beck’s operation is being run, McCabe — aka Xavier Quinn, a very big (and slightly amnesic) bad from Reacher’s past — had Paulie fetch Beck’s son Richard, who’d already lost an ear to his father’s shady alliances.—
Matt Webb Mitovich,
TVLine,
13 Mar. 2025
Adjective
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The people here prefer to be crooked while pretending to be holy.—
Colm Tóibín,
The New Yorker,
2 Mar. 2025
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My tween self wrote a letter to myself stating that my ideal person would have a crooked smile, a sense of humor, honest eyes and a creative palate.—
Lisa Stardust,
People.com,
12 Feb. 2025
Adjective
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Perhaps Simpson’s most dishonest claim was that Social Security’s drafters deliberately set the retirement age at 65 because life expectancy in 1935, at the time of enactment, was 63.—
Michael Hiltzik,
Los Angeles Times,
19 Mar. 2025
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Higher-ups and colleagues see through the charade as dishonest.—
Bryan Robinson,
Forbes,
2 Mar. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Guileful.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/guileful. Accessed 24 Mar. 2025.
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