one-liner
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of one-liner
1965–70, one line + -er 1
Explanation
A one-liner is a joke or clever remark expressed in a single sentence, with a brief setup and a clever twist at the end. As Oscar Wilde said, "I can resist everything, except temptation." The beauty of a one-liner lies in its efficiency. There's no long buildup; it gets straight to the (funny) point. One-liners often rely on wordplay or surprise endings that catch listeners off guard. A popular one-liner is "I'm on a seafood diet — I see food, and I eat it!" Some standup comedians rely heavily on one-liners in their performances, keeping the audience rolling in the aisles! These "blink-and-you'll-miss-it" jokes show that sometimes brevity truly is the soul of wit.
Vocabulary lists containing one-liner
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:
“It’s like climbing a mountain,” he says, flaunting his well-honed ability to turn even the toughest-learned lesson into a playful one-liner: “Everybody’s waving at you, ‘Go back, go back.’
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 24, 2025
Asante is bringing back his best one-liner, “We will shock the world.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 11, 2025
The Thanksgiving episodes are shocking and absurd, packed with scathing one-liner digs and soapy melodrama; feasts so good that you can’t help but come back for more.
From Salon ● May 17, 2025
“Eventually Revolut froze the account. They told me there was nothing they could do. It felt like a one-liner to say sorry.”
From BBC ● Oct. 19, 2024
One of the reasons laughter is so effective as a tool for persuasion—and any stand-up comic who has ever seen off a heckler with a zinging one-liner knows this—is that laughter is involuntary assent.
From "Words Like Loaded Pistols" by Sam Leith
Blunt stole the show with laugh-out-loud one-liners, often delivered dripping with contempt to Hathaway’s bumbling newbie second assistant.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 4, 2026
While there are still "snarky one-liners" and moments of wit in the sequel, the characters find themselves in a "whole new landscape", Blunt says.
From BBC ● May 1, 2026
The “Chuck Norris facts” phenomenon — a stream of absurd one-liners casting him as an invincible force of nature — helped turn the actor into a meme sensation before memes were a business.
From MarketWatch ● Mar. 20, 2026
Known for quotable one-liners and clever quips, Parton has long leveraged witticisms to endear herself to many — including the media.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 22, 2026
I just keep stunning her with the great one-liners.
From "Shelter (Book One): A Mickey Bolitar Novel" by Harlan Coben
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.
