fickle
Americanadjective
-
likely to change, especially due to caprice, irresolution, or instability; casually changeable.
fickle weather.
- Synonyms:
- fitful, capricious, variable, unsteady, unstable
-
not constant or loyal in affections.
a fickle lover.
- Synonyms:
- inconstant
adjective
Related Words
Fickle, inconstant, capricious, vacillating describe persons or things that are not firm or steady in affection, behavior, opinion, or loyalty. Fickle implies an underlying perversity as a cause for the lack of stability: the fickle seasons, disappointing as often as they delight; once lionized, now rejected by a fickle public. Inconstant suggests an innate disposition to change: an inconstant lover, flitting from affair to affair. Capricious implies unpredictable changeability arising from sudden whim: a capricious administration constantly and inexplicably changing its signals; a capricious and astounding reversal of position. Vacillating means changeable due to lack of resolution or firmness: an indecisive, vacillating leader, apparently incapable of a sustained course of action.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of fickle
First recorded before 1000; Middle English fikel, Old English ficol “deceitful,” akin to fācen “treachery,” (be)fician “to deceive,” fǣcne “deceitful,” gefic “deception”
Explanation
People who are fickle change their minds so much you can't rely on them. If your best friend suddenly decides that she doesn't like you one week, and then the next week she wants to hang out again, she's being fickle. Fickle comes from the Old English word ficol, for deceitful. We usually use fickle to talk about people, but it can also be used for abstract things that alternately favor you and abuse you, like the weather. If you win the lottery and then lose everything else in the world that's important to you, fate is being fickle.
Vocabulary lists containing fickle
"Romeo and Juliet" by William Shakespeare, Act III
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Even More Negative Words to Describe a Person
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The Things They Carried
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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.
“We’re very fickle with the small-cap trade, unfortunately,” said Mark Hackett, chief market strategist at Nationwide’s Investment Management Group.
From MarketWatch • May 16, 2026
She can be very fickle, but this is one thing that’s stuck.
From Los Angeles Times • May 8, 2026
Still, Cora remains widely-admired around the game, considered skillful at handling fickle modern players.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 27, 2026
And yet Micron shares are falling, closing Wednesday down another 3.4%, to $382.09; investors have a fickle relationship with Micron after years of getting burned by the cyclical nature of the memory business.
From Barron's • Mar. 25, 2026
A fickle breeze suddenly kicked up sand around us.
From "Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky" by Kwame Mbalia
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.
