flimsy
Americanadjective
-
flimsier,
comparative
-
flimsiest
superlative
noun
-
flimsies
plural
-
a thin kind of paper, especially for use in making several copies at a time of an article, telegraphic dispatch, or the like, as in newspaper work.
-
a copy of a report or dispatch on such paper.
adjective
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not strong or substantial; fragile
a flimsy building
-
light and thin
a flimsy dress
-
unconvincing or inadequate; weak
a flimsy excuse
noun
-
thin paper used for making carbon copies of a letter, etc
-
a copy made on such paper
-
a slang word for banknote
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of flimsy
1695–1705; flim- (perhaps metathetic variant of film ) + -sy
Explanation
You can describe weak, thin, and fragile things as flimsy. Onion smells are strong, onion skins are flimsy. Blaming onions for making you cry during a sad movie, that's a flimsy excuse, when there are no onions in the theater. A flimsy object and a flimsy objection or excuse are both without weight and are easy to knock down. You can see right through a flimsy curtain, and you can see right through a flimsy lie. If a tent or house of cards is flimsy, it will fall down with a slight breeze, and if your story isn't convincing anyone, it's probably weak and flimsy enough to flatten, too.
Vocabulary lists containing flimsy
List 6
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The Cay
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Vocabulary from "Stop Expecting Games to Build Empathy" by Julie Muncy
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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:
According to testimony from the two survivors, their flimsy boat began to deflate and take on water after several hours at sea.
From Barron's ● Sep. 8, 2026
But the characterizations are too flimsy, the world only moderately textured.
From Salon ● Aug. 26, 2026
So the possibility that A.I. might help is admittedly a flimsy source of comfort.
From Slate ● Aug. 26, 2026
Allowing a lawsuit to proceed based on such a flimsy claim of injury would open the floodgates to all manner of claims that rest on nothing more than individuals’ feelings, not concrete injury.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026
Her pulse was frantic, her breathing ragged, and it seemed impossible that people could live at all with such flimsy stuff as skin keeping blood, breath, and spirit safe inside their bodies.
From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor
Otto, melodramatically helped by various Black-Fronters, fled the country, started his years of writing and smuggling through revolutionary flimsies and stickers.
From Time Magazine Archive
Army lieutenant in trackman's flimsies stepped into the discus ring.
From Time Magazine Archive
The flimsies don't begin to come in till eleven.
From Comrade Yetta by Albert Edwards
No fisherman upon the sea ever tangled fish more successfully than we women with our flimsies.
From The Valley of the Moon by Jack London
"I'd better take these two notes away," he said, beginning to fold up the flimsies.
From The Grell Mystery by Frank Froest
However, that argument too, is looking flimsier given how expensive AI models are to build for relatively little payoff.
From Barron's ● Feb. 23, 2026
Many have been enduring temperatures well below freezing in flimsier tent-like units with blue plastic sheeting on the outside and a quilted cotton lining inside.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 21, 2023
“It gets turned into a piece of lace, he says. It gets turned into this much flimsier thing, a thing full of holes.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 4, 2023
They’re the closest thing Asus has to a MacBook Air competitor, with chassis that are slightly flimsier, touchpads with fancier features, and price tags that are a bit less intimidating.
From The Verge ● Aug. 15, 2022
The old mansion still stands deep within this property, though most of the flimsier structures around it have been swallowed by time and the elements.
From "Fablehaven" by Brandon Mull
Suspects were swept up in Afghanistan or Pakistan, often on the flimsiest of tip-offs.
From BBC ● Sep. 10, 2026
The Chobot-Collier team never speaks to the authorities, or any police at all, save for the handlers of a cadaver dog used in a search for Theresa’s body, an effort launched on the flimsiest lead.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 28, 2025
Tania von Uslar-Gleichen, an official at Germany’s Foreign Ministry and lead counsel in the case, told the 15-judge bench that Nicaragua had “rushed this case to court on the basis of the flimsiest evidence.”
From New York Times ● Apr. 9, 2024
“I would certainly not be opting to have this flimsiest of the cases go first,” Diamond said.
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 31, 2023
His own was the flimsiest cotton, and tender in every fiber from long wear.
From "The Golden Goblet" by Eloise Jarvis McGraw
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