hunky
1 Americanadjective
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of hunky1
An Americanism dating back to 1860–65; from obsolete New York City slang term hunk, used especially by boys at play for home base, home (the goal); from Dutch honk “post, station, base, home” + -y 1 ( def. ); see also hunky-dory ( def. )
Origin of hunky2
First recorded in 1910–15; hunk + -y 1
Origin of hunky3
First recorded in 1905–10; (bo)hunk ( def. ) + -y 2 ( def. )
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:
He’s both movie-star hunky and action-star engrossing, flitting between these two deceptively binary ends without breaking a sweat.
From Salon ● Mar. 21, 2026
Other sports are full of hunky types, and football and basketball players are more likely to have all their teeth.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 17, 2025
Though O’Brien is flexing his emotional range here, his hunky sincerity lands in part because Sweeney remains steady in the opposite registry.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 5, 2025
Everybody thought we were lying - this place was all hunky dory.
From BBC ● Jun. 4, 2025
He’s so awesomely gorgeous and manly and hunky.
From "Please Ignore Vera Dietz" by A.S. King
“The Stockyards’ owners imported Billy Sunday to divert their underpaid hunkies from going on strike by shouting them dizzy with God,” he tells us.
From The New Yorker ● Feb. 4, 2019
Harris Burnham, hearing his aunt thus condemn his excursion into socialistic journalism, replies by going to work with the hunkies in a copper mill.
From Time Magazine Archive
The bear howled murder as the stuff ran into his eyes, and plunking himself on his hunkies, he began to paw and scrape it out.
From Red Saunders' Pets and Other Critters by Phillips, Henry Wallace
He looked like a shorter, hunkier Robert Redford, immediately getting more of my attention than I usually gave to the next fare.
From Salon ● Jan. 2, 2016
Then there’s Steve Jobs, as played by his hunkier lookalike Ashton Kutcher — that should have lured some people to the box office.
From Time ● Aug. 18, 2013
Our age demands something hunkier, less menacing, sort of a surfer dude to help us catch the curl of our last wave gracefully.
From Time Magazine Archive
First of all, George Clooney is both hunkier and a better actor than Chad Everett.
From Time Magazine Archive
The period drama starring Aidan Turner as the hunkiest man in Cornwall ends its five-season run on “Masterpiece.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 15, 2019
The Durrells are still in Corfu in “The Durrells in Corfu” and “Poldark” is still the hunkiest fellow in Cornwall as these two period dramas return for new seasons on “Masterpiece.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 28, 2018
So who cared about the world premiere of Dr. No, the first film made from Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels, or about the introduction of Sean Connery as Her Majesty’s hunkiest secret servant?
From Time ● Oct. 5, 2012
Ponder beat the Twins’ catcher/heartthrob Joe Mauer in a Minneapolis radio contest to determine the region’s hunkiest athlete.
From New York Times ● Oct. 28, 2011
An' Billy ain't none back'ard admittin' he is, an' allows on hesitatin' it's the hunkiest baby in Arizona.
From Wolfville by Lewis, Alfred Henry
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.
