liar
Americannoun
-
liars
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of liar
before 950; Middle English lier, Old English lēogere. See lie 1, -ar 1
Explanation
A liar is someone who doesn't tell the truth. A liar tells lies. "Liar, liar, pants on fire," a phrase of unknown origin, is a children's jump-rope rhyme also used as a playground taunt. Adults, and especially political commentators, have also been known to use the phrase or part of it as a particularly demeaning insult aimed at politicians who make outrageous claims that can't possibly be true. Notice that liar ends in -ar, not -er, as you might expect.
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 an interview with The Times earlier this month, Arday admitted making academic "mistakes" but said he was being wrongly "portrayed to be a liar and a fantasist".
From Barron's ● Aug. 15, 2026
Arday has admitted to mistakes, but said he was being wrongly "portrayed to be a liar and a fantasist and an academic fraud."
From Barron's ● Aug. 11, 2026
Arday admitted errors in his work, telling the Times, external in an interview on Saturday that he was accountable for those mistakes but that "what I am not is a liar".
From BBC ● Aug. 1, 2026
Any comedian that tells you otherwise is a liar.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 7, 2026
"Your daughter's a cheat and a liar," the father said, taking his plate of fish and placing it on his knees.
From "Matilda" by Roald Dahl
I do think she’s calling the supermajority liars.
From Slate ● Jun. 3, 2026
“Their entire case is built on murderer’s row — a bunch of liars just trying to get out of jail,” Tedford said.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 28, 2026
Ms. Adelman describes how Lewis’s specimens fell into the hands of a series of botanists—some of them charlatans, drunkards, liars or thieves—who squandered his legacy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 16, 2026
Navy attack on an alleged Venezuelan drug-smuggling boat, and almost certain liars for their accounts of the incident.
From Salon ● Dec. 20, 2025
They were called liars and unbelievers, and while they were never physically harmed, even children laughed at them — at their strange crimson costumes and heavy, dusty books locked in huge, iron-bound trunks.
From "Ash" by Malinda Lo
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.
