small fry
Americannoun
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a child: He's a small fry with a big personality.
Here's a treat for the small fry.
He's a small fry with a big personality.
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an unimportant person or object.
Her fancy parties were closed to the small fry.
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a small or young fish.
plural noun
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people or things regarded as unimportant
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young children
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young or small fishes
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Young children, as in This show is not suitable for small fry .
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Persons of little importance or influence, as in She wasn't about to invite the Washington small fry to the reception . Both usages allude to fry in the sense of “young or small fish.” [Late 1800s]
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of small fry
First recorded in 1895–1900; fry 2
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.
Such small fry could easily flail or fail.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 13, 2026
Several clients raised the question of whether this bet was being redefined to benefit “whales,” or big-money gamblers, at the expense of the small fry.
From MarketWatch • Jan. 5, 2026
Big money for a side operating on frees and non-contracts not so long ago, but small fry when it comes to pushing for the Premier League.
From BBC • Apr. 28, 2025
Some passages one might almost call psychedelic if that word didn’t seem inappropriate to small fry.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 8, 2024
I never understood what Tariq saw in that small fry.
From "How It Went Down" by Kekla Magoon
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.
