flighty
Americanadjective
-
given to flights of fancy; capricious; frivolous.
- Synonyms:
- irresponsible, undependable, mercurial
-
slightly delirious; light-headed; mildly crazy.
-
irresponsible.
He said I was too flighty to be a good supervisor.
-
Archaic. swift or fleet.
adjective
-
frivolous and irresponsible; capricious; volatile
-
mentally erratic, unstable, or wandering
-
flirtatious; coquettish
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of flighty
Explanation
If you're flighty, you're flaky and a little bit thoughtless. Flighty people change their minds and plans at the drop of a hat. Flighty people are unreliable and irresponsible — they often forget appointments, show up late, and change their minds about important things at the last minute. If you need help with something important, don't count on a flighty person for help. The original meaning of flighty, in the 1500's, was "swift" or "speedy." By the late 1700's, it had come to mean "fickle or frivolous," and was often used to describe skittish horses.
Vocabulary lists containing flighty
To All the Boys I've Loved Before
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"The Tragedy of Macbeth," Vocabulary from Act 4
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A Streetcar Named Desire
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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.
See Examples For:
In her run-down Victorian house, she produces a literary journal, Vista, and provides lodging to four tenants: Robbie, a struggling writer; Georgina, a flighty debutante; Mina, an ambitious cinema usherette; and Saul, a wartime refugee.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 15, 2026
Undertaking a new challenge every few years can show employers you’re ambitious, but not flighty.
From MarketWatch ● Dec. 22, 2025
One insider who has been part of conversations about the chances of changing the leader says, "it's not flighty people, not just newbies without a clue, they're not idiots".
From BBC ● Sep. 27, 2025
It ought to be a great role for her but the movie is too shallow and flighty to do her justice.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 27, 2023
She pretends to be foolish, flighty, and immature.
From "At Last She Stood" by Erin Entrada Kelly
Ms. Oates’s book has more warmth, though it’s also flabbier and flightier.
From New York Times ● Feb. 14, 2011
For the last 20 years, while flightier musicians have run off after every new craze in jazz, swing or bebop, Wayne King has stuck tenaciously to the waltz.
From Time Magazine Archive
The trade-off is a flightier, more mercurial and more tabloid pop culture.
From Time Magazine Archive
Some flightier, more fantastic movies go heavy on the CG.
From Time Magazine Archive
"He will shed his flightier notions as a young bird moults its down."
From Bart Ridgeley A Story of Northern Ohio by Riddle, A. G.
Kimber—the flightiest, girliest Hologram, with the longest, most labor-intensive hair—only dates girls; nobody thinks that’s a problem, nor does anybody think it odd that she falls for someone with Stormer’s body type.
From The New Yorker ● Nov. 19, 2015
It would encourage her to indulge her worst, flightiest, most self-absorbed tendencies.
From Slate ● Jan. 23, 2013
This performance, which looks intelligent, does not strain the brain of even the flightiest hen.
From Time Magazine Archive
To his Majesty this was merely the voice of Max at his flightiest.
From King John of Jingalo The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties by Housman, Laurence
But the impatient swain went off and pinned himself to the flightiest little humming-bird in all Soitgoes, and in a month was married, having a long life before him for bitterness and repentance.
From Two Christmas Celebrations by Parker, Theodore
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.
