con artist
Americannoun
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a person adept at lying, cajolery, or glib self-serving talk.
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a person adept at swindling by means of confidence games; swindler.
Usage
What does con artist mean? A con artist is a person who cheats people out of something (usually money or other valuables) through some kind of deceitful scheme. More generally, the term is used to refer to someone who’s good at deceiving people for their own gain. In con artist, the word con is short for confidence, a reference to how they gain their victims’ trust in order to cheat them. The same term is used in con man (a male con artist). The word artist in this context simply refers to a person who is skillful (in this case, at trickery and deception). Example: I can’t believe how many people are falling for this guy’s tricks—he’s clearly a con artist who’s going to cheat and pocket all the money.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
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.
A con artist is someone whose craft is to win your trust.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 30, 2026
A con artist, a music-industry legend and the feud over a masterpiece.
From MarketWatch ● Jan. 12, 2026
Hiding her true identity behind more than 40 aliases, con artist Annie Gordon Baillie made a living swindling shopkeepers across Victorian Britain.
From BBC ● May 22, 2025
Liz Dawson, “Retreat’s” crafty con artist, switches identities to stay ahead of her misdeeds like a wolf covering its tracks.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 25, 2025
He told her that Cofield was a con artist, and had her sign a document forbidding Cofield access to her family’s records.
From "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" by Rebecca Skloot
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.
