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old shoe

American  

noun

Informal.
  1. a person or thing that is comfortably familiar and unpretentious.

    Uncle Will is a lovable old shoe.


old shoe Idioms  
  1. see comfortable as an old shoe.


Other Word Forms

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:

My knife also became something of a conversation piece—friends I cooked for wanted to try it, drawing it from its homemade cover, crafted from old shoe boxes.

From The Wall Street Journal Nov. 23, 2025

It was a grind that gave way to a routine as comfortable as an old shoe.

From Los Angeles Times Oct. 25, 2025

“It was like putting on an old shoe, a shoe so old the laces were gone,” Burrows jokes.

From Seattle Times Oct. 11, 2023

For Neill, playing Grant was like putting on an old shoe: “It’s comfortable and I know exactly what to do with the shoe.”

From Washington Post Jun. 10, 2022

He was thin and blotchy, and his nose was scuffed up like an old shoe.

From "Flush" by Carl Hiaasen

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