Nazi

American  

[naht-see, nat-] / ˈnɑt si, ˈnæt- /

noun

Nazis plural

1. a member of the National Socialist German Workers' Party, which controlled Germany from 1933 to 1945 under Adolf Hitler and advocated totalitarian government, territorial expansion, antisemitism, and Aryan supremacy, all these leading directly to World War II and the Holocaust.

2. (often lowercase) a person elsewhere who holds similar views.

3. (often lowercase) a person who is fanatically dedicated to or seeks to regulate a specified activity, practice, etc..

   a jazz nazi who disdains other forms of music;

   health nazis trying to ban junk food.

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adjective

1. of or relating to the Nazis.

Nazi British  

/ ˈnɑːtsɪ, ˈnɑːtsɪˌɪzəm, ˈnɑːtˌsɪzəm /

noun

1. a member of the fascist National Socialist German Workers' Party, which was founded in 1919 and seized political control in Germany in 1933 under Adolf Hitler

2. derogatory anyone who thinks or acts like a Nazi, esp showing racism, brutality, etc

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adjective

1. of, characteristic of, or relating to the Nazis

Sensitive Note

Nazi in the extended sense of “a fanatical or domineering person” has existed at least since 1980 and parallels the use of the word police in the language police/the grammar police . Though this usage of Nazi is usually intended as jocular, it implies being intolerant of other people’s views and practices. And many people consider any extended use of the word Nazi to be offensive, in that it trivializes the terrible crimes of the German Nazis.

Other Word Forms

• Nazism
  noun
• anti-Nazi
  adjective
• pro-Nazi
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of Nazi

First recorded in 1930–35; from German Nazi, short for Nationalsozialist “National Socialist”

Example Sentences

In 1945, there was no way under national or international law that the operatives of the Nazi state could be tried.

From Salon • May 18, 2026

No relevant precedent existed, and given the unique crimes the Nazi hierarchy had committed, it would require ex post facto laws to prosecute them.

From Salon • May 18, 2026

Tanner points out that Walter Rauff, another wanted Nazi war criminal who fled to Chile, spent time in Germany in 1960.

From BBC • May 15, 2026

Schulz was an illustrator as well as a writer, and before he was murdered during the war he was forced to paint a bedroom mural for an occupying Nazi officer in what is now Ukraine.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 15, 2026

The Blood Banner was a flag that was supposedly dipped in the blood of Herbert Norkus and other martyrs who had sacrificed their lives for the Nazi Party.

From "Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow" by Susan Campbell Bartoletti