cagey
Americanadjective
adjective
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of cagey
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Food professionals from haute cuisine down to trend-savvy sandwich shops tend to be cagey about where they get their ramps.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 13, 2026
A second US official was cagey when asked about whether an extension was likely to be agreed on Trump's trip.
From Barron's ● May 10, 2026
There has been a dramatic and stunning extra-time defeat thanks to Karim Benzema in the 2019-20 semis, and a gut-wrenching loss on penalties after a cagey match at the Etihad in the 2023-24 last eight.
From BBC ● Mar. 17, 2026
They went with serve and the seventh game was another tussle, Sabalenka holding for 4-3 after the best rally of a cagey affair.
From Barron's ● Jan. 31, 2026
The colonel sat down and settled back, calm and cagey suddenly, and ingratiatingly polite.
From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller
With what's at stake, though, it might be a little cagier than that.
From BBC ● May 8, 2025
Mr. Gaetz became cagier when the subject turned to how he intended to use his influence on the burning issues of the day, including the debt ceiling and funding for Ukraine.
From New York Times ● Jan. 29, 2023
But others, especially those in the heavily polluting energy sector, have been cagier about their intentions or have resisted overhauling operations for the sake of planetary survival.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 14, 2021
The answer here was cagier, and I was asked not to quote it directly.
From Slate ● Aug. 12, 2021
The athletes, less forthright about their body-image issues, were cagier about their usage.
From The Guardian ● Jan. 31, 2020
Few can parry like Bacon — and he was at his cagiest about his work, speaking abstractly of the importance of “chance” and “accident.”
From New York Times ● Mar. 23, 2021
Yet here she was, about to match wits with some of the cleverest and cagiest card players in the world.
From Washington Post ● Jul. 1, 2020
Though I had expected Johns to be guarded about his past or his personal life, it was a surprise to find him cagiest about his artistic process.
From New York Times ● Feb. 18, 2019
She has a winsome translator, a force of loyal eunuch fighters and an adviser who happens to be the cagiest person in this entire story.
From New York Times ● Jun. 24, 2016
Why, even old Tom, the father, is, for all his seeming of pompous emptiness, the craftiest and cagiest old chap in the National Union Club.
From Destiny by Buck, Charles Neville
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.
