prankster
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of prankster
Explanation
A prankster is someone who loves to play tricks or practical jokes. If your house gets rolled in the night, a prankster hung toilet paper all over the trees in your yard. Congratulations? To be a prankster, you need a mischievous sense of humor and enough imagination to dream up practical jokes. You could glue a ten-dollar bill to the floor, change your sister's computer settings to Portuguese, or leave your fake bug collection on your teacher's chair. These tricks or hoaxes are also called pranks, the origin of prankster, which probably stems from the obsolete verb prank, "decorate or dress up."
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.
The possibility that it was a prankster on the radio may not be 0%.
From MarketWatch • Feb. 11, 2026
Just nine years ago, the documentary prankster John Wilson was here crashing on a couch and shooting a snarky short called “Escape From Park City” about his discomfort with its star-gazing and schmoozing.
From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 25, 2026
At roughly the same time, a 16-year-old prankster from Ohio named Jake Paul was posting six-second Vine videos - chatting to pineapples in supermarkets and climbing into strangers' shopping trolleys for a laugh.
From BBC • Dec. 19, 2025
With that in mind, the shadow cockroach “Angels” projects into your kitchen may be just a bit of Peter Pan-esque play from an inveterate digital prankster.
From Salon • Nov. 7, 2025
Mrs. Levy' had looked some-thing like a prankster with her golden-white hair, her sunglasses with the blue lenses, the aquamarine mascara that made a ring around the blue lenses like a halo.
From "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole
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.
