adjective
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tending to curl; curling
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having curls
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(of timber) having irregular curves or waves in the grain
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difficult to counter or answer
a curly question
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of curly
Explanation
Something that's curly is wavy, coiled, or spiral-shaped. While you might envy your friend's straight, shiny hair, she may be equally envious of your wild, curly hair. You can add curly ribbons to a plain package to dress it up, or buy kale in different varieties, including one with curly leaves. You're most likely to use the adjective curly, however, to describe someone's hair, if it falls in ringlets. Curly comes from curl, which was originally crulle, probably from the Middle Dutch word krul, "curly."
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:
Police described Noah as white, with curly ginger hair, and said he would not respond to his name being called.
From BBC ● Sep. 15, 2026
I was more stressed than usual before my meditation session, because the researchers had instructed me to avoid coffee and hair gel—directions I found problematic for both my reporting focus and my curly hair.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 27, 2026
Otherwise, they’re shielded from the sun under his white baseball cap and his curly hair.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 11, 2026
After her cancer went into remission, she wanted to restore her long curly hair and began taking biotin supplements after reading about them online.
From Science Daily ● May 7, 2026
She jumped about a foot at my contact, her curly brown hair whipping across her face as she turned terrified green eyes up to meet mine.
From "Glitch" by Laura Martin
The researchers found that the animals had longer, curlier hair, but no evidence that the mammoth's fat-increasing gene had an effect.
From BBC ● Mar. 4, 2025
“I love my hair because the curlier and the more strength that you have, the better your twist-outs are,” Henson said with a laugh.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 2, 2023
The less evenly distributed the squiggly proteins are, the curlier the hair.
From Scientific American ● Aug. 16, 2023
“It’s curlier and frizzier and I love it,” Kouatchou said.
From Reuters ● Oct. 24, 2021
But then her little-girl curls flattened out while mine got curlier, and her features sharpened, turning her face beautiful instead of just cute.
From "Keeping Pace" by Laurie Morrison
I don’t recall which of my appeals drew Todbaum’s curliest scorn, only that it got pretty curly.
From The New Yorker ● Feb. 25, 2019
Limping, hobbling, they tussled until nightfall, when the Navy goat had to admit that the absence of Shapely, one of its curliest horns, was too great a handicap.
From Time Magazine Archive
Big nose and big ears and the curliest hair at the fair.
From "The Midwife's Apprentice" by Karen Cushman
It was Di at her curliest, at her fluffiest, Di conscious of her bracelet, Di smiling.
From Miss Lulu Bett by Zona Gale
It would take out the curliest curl that ever was in thirty seconds.
From Betty Wales, Sophomore by Margaret Warde
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.
