fly-by-night

[ flahy-bahy-nahyt ]
See synonyms for: fly-by-nightfly-by-nights on Thesaurus.com

adjective
  1. not reliable or responsible, especially in business; untrustworthy: a fly-by-night operation.

  2. not lasting; brief; impermanent; transitory: a fly-by-night theater.

nounAlso fly-by-nighter.
  1. a person or thing that is unreliable, especially a debtor who evades or attempts to evade creditors.

  2. a person regarded as a poor credit risk.

Origin of fly-by-night

1
First recorded in 1790–1800

Words Nearby fly-by-night

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use fly-by-night in a sentence

  • Some of the groups have been around for decades, others are fly-by-night.

    Welcome to Assadville, USA | Christopher Moraff | November 11, 2014 | THE DAILY BEAST
  • And not fly-by-night issues either, but stalwarts such as G.E., Citi, Google.

    Return of the Day Trader | Lee Eisenberg | April 9, 2009 | THE DAILY BEAST
  • What gets me is, when you boil our two fly-by-night stories down, I've come here to be alone.

    Seven Keys to Baldpate | Earl Derr Biggers
  • She now knew where she was, but was nearly dying from the exhaustion of his fly-by-night expeditions.

    Crooked Trails | Frederic Remington
  • Throughout the country local managers began to steal the Madison Square plays and put them on with "fly-by-night" companies.

    Charles Frohman: Manager and Man | Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman
  • Theres hundreds of these little fly-by-night mining camps in this here Western country.

  • Shown up in our newspapers as a ditch-digger—a fly-by-night—a nobody!

    The Landloper | Holman Day

British Dictionary definitions for fly-by-night

fly-by-night

/ informal /


adjective
  1. unreliable or untrustworthy, esp in finance

  2. brief; impermanent

nounAlso: fly-by-nighter
  1. an untrustworthy person, esp one who departs secretly or by night to avoid paying debts

  2. a person who goes out at night to places of entertainment

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Cultural definitions for fly-by-night

fly-by-night

Shady or untrustworthy: “Before buying stock in a newly formed company, the prudent investor will check its owners' credentials to make sure it's not a fly-by-night operation.”

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.