verb
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to dupe; trick
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obsolete to cover or hide
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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hoodwinksimple
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hoodwinkssimple
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have hoodwinkedperfect
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has hoodwinkedperfect
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am hoodwinkingprogressive
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are hoodwinkingprogressive
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is hoodwinkingprogressive
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have been hoodwinkingperfect progressive
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has been hoodwinkingperfect progressive
Past
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hoodwinkedsimple
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had hoodwinkedperfect
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was hoodwinkingprogressive
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were hoodwinkingprogressive
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had been hoodwinkingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of hoodwink
Explanation
To hoodwink someone means to trick or mislead them. Beware of fake ATMs that try to hoodwink you into giving over your bank card and your code, only to keep them both and steal all your money. An excellent, old-fashioned word is hoodwink, and you’ll be happy you know it when you have to read Victorian novels in which characters are repeatedly hoodwinked. It is an Old English compound which meant "to blindfold" 600 years ago but quickly began to be used figuratively. Think about the expression, to pull the wool over someone's eyes, as having the same image and meaning. Has your big sister ever hoodwinked you into doing her chores for her?
Vocabulary lists containing hoodwink
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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Tricky Terms for April Fool's Day
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The Tragedy of Macbeth
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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:
It soon became apparent that my name and image were being used by scammers to try to hoodwink people out of money.
From BBC ● Feb. 5, 2025
The prosecution has said Wirecard's management invented vast sums of phantom revenue to hoodwink investors and creditors.
From Reuters ● Dec. 6, 2022
"These defendants schemed to create a high-pressure, fraudulent marketing campaign to hoodwink investors into believing that their bogus real estate venture generated substantial profits," said U.S.
From Salon ● Oct. 14, 2022
For example, they hoodwink their parents when moving out of their summer dorm room and mislead a judge in an audition.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 15, 2022
Country people we may be, but by golly yokels that you can hoodwink we are jolly well not!'”
From "Black Swan Green" by David Mitchell
Alex is so attuned to the “textures and habits” of the elite, so sure she can pull one over on them that she of course hoodwinks herself.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 11, 2023
Jackman plays Harold Hill, the con man who hoodwinks the good citizens of River City, Iowa, into believing that he can transform their untrained youngsters into a professional-grade marching band.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 2, 2022
He's charismatic and persuasive, and he somehow hoodwinks a class just as impressionable as he.
From The Guardian ● Jul. 3, 2012
Or perhaps Facebook is betting we're too lazy and ignorant to read the fine print, just like wireless carriers who try to dazzle us with their sleight-of-plan hoodwinks.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 6, 2012
A false message carried by an American courier hoodwinks the British.
From "George Washington, Spymaster" by Thomas B. Allen
As it turns out, I’m hardly the only person to have felt hoodwinked, bamboozled, and/or flat-out deceived by my smartphone’s forecasts in 2026.
From Slate ● Aug. 21, 2026
Let him know that there’s a chance this is a romance scam/honey trap and that even the smartest people get hoodwinked by nefarious characters who take advantage of their loneliness.
From MarketWatch ● Mar. 23, 2026
"Although I did get an email from somebody saying, 'Where's Orca? That's been on repeat.' So people have been hoodwinked by it."
From BBC ● Aug. 22, 2025
When he did show up for a contentious interview with Bloomberg editor-in-chief John Micklethwait at the Chicago Economic Club, Trump complained that he was "hoodwinked to go on that."
From Salon ● Oct. 18, 2024
“You think he is mistaken? Or that I have somehow hoodwinked him? Fooled the Dark Lord, the greatest wizard, the most accomplished Legilimens the world has ever seen?”
From "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" by J.K. Rowling
It is digital trickery, hoodwinking the brain into seeing something that isn't really there.
From BBC ● Oct. 19, 2023
Their story was that the CHP insisted on the nighttime move for the public’s safety, but on the Palos Verdes Peninsula, and in Times letters to the editor, the muttering was about hoodwinking and betrayal.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 17, 2023
What is it about scams and hoodwinking that appeals to us in a visceral way that we want to read these stories, and we want to explore them?
From Salon ● Jul. 11, 2023
At one point he sent for me, and I found him on his cellphone with someone on the crew, proposing a plot that, I soon gathered, involved hoodwinking Gilligan.
From New York Times ● Feb. 9, 2022
But Seabiscuit could not be coaxed into showing any speed at all, and to find out if the horse was hoodwinking him, Fitzsimmons opted to make an exception to his nowhip rule.
From "Seabiscuit: An American Legend" by Laura Hillenbrand
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.
