smuggle

American  

[smuhg-uhl] / ˈsmʌg əl /

verb (used with object)

• smuggles,
  present (3rd person singular)
• smuggled,
  past participle,  past
• smuggling
  present participle

1. to import or export (goods) secretly, in violation of the law, especially without payment of legal duty.

2. to bring, take, put, etc., surreptitiously.

   She smuggled the gun into the jail inside a cake.

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verb (used without object)

• smuggles,
  present (3rd person singular)
• smuggled,
  past participle,  past
• smuggling
  present participle

1. to import, export, or convey goods surreptitiously or in violation of the law.

smuggle British  

/ ˈsmʌɡəl /

verb

1. to import or export (prohibited or dutiable goods) secretly

2. (tr; often foll by into or out of) to bring or take secretly, as against the law or rules

3. to conceal; hide

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• smuggler
  noun
• smuggling
  noun
• antismuggling
  adjective
• unsmuggled
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Participles

• smuggling
  present
• smuggled
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• smuggle
  simple
• smuggles
  simple
• have smuggled
  perfect
• has smuggled
  perfect
• am smuggling
  progressive
• are smuggling
  progressive
• is smuggling
  progressive
• have been smuggling
  perfect progressive
• has been smuggling
  perfect progressive

Past

• smuggled
  simple
• had smuggled
  perfect
• was smuggling
  progressive
• were smuggling
  progressive
• had been smuggling
  perfect progressive

Future

• will smuggle
  simple
• will have smuggled
  perfect
• will be smuggling
  progressive
• will have been smuggling
  perfect progressive

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Etymology

Origin of smuggle

1680–90; < Low German smuggeln; cognate with German schmuggeln

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Explanation

If you import or export something without paying customs duties, you smuggle it. All kinds of things have been smuggled over the years: art, alcohol, drugs, animals, even tea! The verb smuggle has expanded to generally mean to bring something in or out in secret, especially if doing so breaks a rule or a law. Kids may smuggle candy into a movie theater so they don't have to pay the high prices at the concession stand. You may smuggle Christmas presents into the house so your kids don't see them. Illegal immigrants may be smuggled into the country for a fee, but if caught they can be deported.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

smuggle smuggles smuggled smuggling

Do not smuggle in assumptions from the past.

From MarketWatch ● Sep. 15, 2026

Last Thursday's arrest follows that of a 23-year-old Thai citizen in July, also caught at Johannesburg's OR Tambo International Airport, who was attempting to smuggle 418 parrot eggs.

From BBC ● Aug. 26, 2026

The server maker ended an investigation into an alleged scheme by two employees and a contractor to smuggle Nvidia chips to China.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 24, 2026

For years, authorities say, Ghomi used an intermediary in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates to smuggle U.S. tech into his home country of Iran, where he is a dual-citizen.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 4, 2026

He and Jutta smuggle the device back to Viktoriastrasse 3 and appraise it beneath an electric lamp.

From "All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr

But Walsh smuggles in an entirely different claim beneath these factual details: that Parks was effectively a political actress participating in a manufactured hoax.

From Salon ● May 20, 2026

Neither simplistically optimistic nor preachy, “Hoppers” smuggles timely ideas inside a rodent body.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 6, 2026

Treating occurrences as things that exist smuggles confusion into our language and concepts.

From Science Daily ● Nov. 2, 2025

Kigali denies UN evidence that it smuggles vast amounts of gold and other metals out of eastern DR Congo and sells them as its own.

From BBC ● Feb. 7, 2025

He's the one who smuggles me my news stories, even a book every now and again, in exchange for helping him with this dark deed or that one.

From "Dread Nation" by Justina Ireland

Six years ago, 26 rare reptiles - 10 of them dead - smuggled inside parcels of toys and sweets from Mexico, were found by customs officials at Cologne Bonn Airport.

From BBC ● Oct. 15, 2026

As a young man, by his account, he smuggled diamonds, oversaw coconut plantations, dynamited fish, captained schooners and hunted killer cannibals in the New Guinea jungle.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 2, 2026

The Wall Street Journal’s Dasl Yoon and a former North Korean soldier examine a smartphone that was smuggled out of the world’s most reclusive nation.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 28, 2026

Pesticides prohibited in Kenya are sometimes smuggled across this porous border with Tanzania and used in farms within the Amboseli area, where elephants live near human settlements and are known to raid farms for food.

From BBC ● Aug. 24, 2026

Even with smuggled food, Janina had gotten thinner and thinner.

From "Milkweed" by Jerry Spinelli

It is unclear why the vessel was in the area or whether it was part of a human smuggling operation.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 16, 2026

Mahmoud Ali Youssouf also stressed the urgent need to "address the root causes of irregular migration, combat migrant smuggling and trafficking in persons, and promote safe, orderly and regular migration".

From Barron's ● Oct. 11, 2026

The prosecutor added that phone smuggling in London was "prolific" and a "very significant societal problem".

From BBC ● Sep. 25, 2026

Georgia’s Department of Corrections has arrested 18 staff and 92 civilians this year for smuggling contraband into prisons.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 14, 2026

At first Janina’s father did not know she went smuggling with me.

From "Milkweed" by Jerry Spinelli

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Related Words

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