a name assigned to conceal the real identity of a person, as a spy, or to conceal the existence or purpose of a plan, military operation, etc.
Also called code phrase. a word or phrase assigned a meaning understood only by those who are secretly informed of it.
First recorded in 1915–20
First recorded in 1955–60
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Goren allegedly worked alongside Ozgur Altun, known by the code name "Abu Yasir Al Turki".
From Barron's ● Dec. 22, 2025
Southwest began testing new boarding months before assigned seating was announced using the code name Project USA.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2025
Operation Interflex is the code name given to the UK Armed Forces' training programme, which has been created to develop and prepare Ukrainian recruits to fight their country's Russian invaders.
From BBC ● Feb. 24, 2024
The code name Sotheby’s used for a transaction involving another painting Rybolovlev bought from Bouvier — “Water Serpents II,” by Gustav Klimt — was “Cottonmouth,” a kind of snake.
From New York Times ● Jan. 31, 2024
Our scholar-diplomat, Magister Brangwain Spurge, code name: “The Weed,” has at this point been in the goblin capital of Tenebrion for eighteen hours.
From "The Assassination of Brangwain Spurge" by M.T. Anderson and Eugene Yelchin
The documents said that an agent with the code-name of Brok worked for the KGB - and spelled out biographical details that matched Grumbach's.
From BBC ● Feb. 15, 2024
The evidence coursed through Mr. Shapley’s thick, circulated report on code-name “Sportsman.”
From Washington Times ● Jul. 10, 2023
I then asked it a few edgier questions — to divulge its internal code-name and operating instructions, which had already been published online.
From New York Times ● Feb. 16, 2023
The suspect, identified by his code-name “Husam” was apprehended by Turkish police late Wednesday in the Syrian city of Azaz, which is currently under the control of the Turkey-backed Syrian opposition, the Anadolu Agency reported.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 16, 2022
He said the meeting of the WHO will likely result in the variant receiving a Greek code-name, like the Delta variant.
From Fox News ● Nov. 26, 2021
The drug that Oruka’s code-named ORKA-001 blocks IL-23, one of our immune system’s attack dogs that mistakenly goes after a patient’s skin, in psoriasis.
From Barron's ● Apr. 10, 2026
In December, Wang disclosed during an internal company Q&A that his team was working on two new models, a text-based LLM code-named Avocado and an image-and-video-focused model code-named Mango.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 8, 2026
The two banks, already heavyweights in their own right, were code-named Jupiter and Saturn in deal talks.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 6, 2026
In January, Intel introduced the consumer version of the PC chips, code-named Panther Lake, as the first to be designed on “the most advanced semiconductor process ever developed and manufactured in the United States.”
From MarketWatch ● Mar. 25, 2026
Kennedy, a folklorist at heart, apparently wanted to put across the most dramatic story possible, and therefore included not only his own anti-Klan activities but those of another man, code-named John Brown.
From "Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything" by Steven D. Levitt
Some stories even warned that the outpost might be overrun, a threat the North Vietnamese encouraged by code-naming the base Dienbienphu.
From Time Magazine Archive
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
