moonlighting
Britishnoun
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working at a secondary job
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(in 19th-century Ireland) the carrying out of cattle-maiming, murders, etc, during the night in protest against the land-tenure system
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.
He quit Momofuku Ko but when the chef at Sergeantsville Inn left, he stepped in and was soon moonlighting in the kitchen a few days a week.
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 27, 2026
Back in 2001, the English Premier League took that step and fans saw a drastic improvement once the referees no longer spent their days moonlighting as teachers or taxi drivers.
From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 17, 2025
The 24-year-old is moonlighting at Eurovision from his day job at the Vienna State Opera, where he's had roles in The Magic Flute and Von der Liebe Tod.
From BBC • May 16, 2025
Beside him was Ahmad Al-Ali, a 20-year-old nursing student who was now moonlighting in construction to help pay expenses for his wife and two kids, as well as his parents.
From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 6, 2025
Teachers, especially a teacher moonlighting as a counselor, tend to get left out of student gossip.
From "Thirteen Reasons Why" by Jay Asher
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.
