queen bee
Americannoun
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queen bees
plural
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a fertile female bee.
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a woman who is in a favored or preeminent position.
noun
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the fertile female bee in a hive
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informal a woman in a position of dominance or ascendancy over her peers or associates
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of queen bee
First recorded in 1600–10
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.
A queen bee reaches maturity in about 16 days, while worker bees require roughly 21 days.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 23, 2026
Now we’re on Vegas World; now we’re on Jurassic Planet; now we’re on a planet ruled by a gigantic queen bee.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 31, 2026
The four Ghostbusters, for instance, bring distinct skills and backgrounds to the table, while the witches in “The Craft” each embody a different archetype of teenage girlhood, from outcast to queen bee.
From Salon ● Oct. 19, 2024
It wasn’t clear if the hive was simply following a queen bee that attached herself to the engine, he added.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 9, 2024
She was one of the founders of Garland, the queen bee of the place when I lived there.
From "Schooled" by Gordon Korman
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.
