off-color
AmericanEtymology
Origin of off-color
First recorded in 1855–60
Explanation
Something that's off-color is offensive or vulgar. Your parents might stop inviting your uncle for Thanksgiving after years of his embarrassing, off-color jokes. You'll most often find the adjective off-color describing jokes that make some listeners laugh, but offend or disgust others. Standup comedians are frequently famous for their off-color humor, while politicians caught telling off-color stories can face serious career difficulties. Before American English adopted off-color to mean "in questionable taste," this adjective was used to describe faulty gemstones.
Vocabulary lists containing off-color
Forget Me Not
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Hick
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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.
While accepting the inaugural award for best podcast at last Sunday’s Golden Globes, Amy Poehler — perennial optimist and the mind behind some of contemporary culture’s most feel-good media — made a rare off-color joke.
From Salon • Jan. 16, 2026
In the one-way broadcast channel, guests could only emoji-react, so the thread wasn’t cluttered with giant stickers or, say, off-color replies from an unfiltered uncle.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 16, 2025
But let’s be clear: Plenty of people wrote mean, off-color things that they wouldn’t say out loud.
From Slate • Sep. 11, 2025
The humor, at once simple and clever, innocent and off-color, amiably wants to get a rise, and Horn isn’t too proud to go low in his genial wordplay.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 22, 2025
An off-color anecdote, a laugh in the wrong place.
From "Native Speaker" by Chang-rae Lee
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.
