inkling
Americannoun
-
a slight suggestion or indication; hint; intimation.
They hadn't given us an inkling of what was going to happen.
-
a vague idea or notion; slight understanding.
They didn't have an inkling of how the new invention worked.
noun
Etymology
Origin of inkling
1505–15; obsolete inkle to hint ( Middle English inklen ) + -ing 1; akin to Old English inca suspicion
Explanation
Is someone yapping on and on and you only have the vaguest idea of what they're talking about? Then you understood just an inkling — a glimmer, a fraction — of what they were saying. Inkling can also mean a sly suggestion or faint implication. If someone drops a hint you're not wanted they've given you an inkling you're not wanted. The word comes from the medieval English word inclen, which suitably enough means "to utter in an undertone." In other words, what's really being said is in between the lines of what's actually being said on the surface. By now you've probably got the inkling that inklings can be sneaky things.
Vocabulary lists containing inkling
Wonder
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Flowers for Algernon
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The Diary of a Young Girl
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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.
“If you have pretty good inkling what you want to do,” Maslin urged, “vote.”
From Los Angeles Times • May 3, 2026
“I had no inkling that it was Janie, none, even though she had told me weeks later, that she did it and blah, blah, blah,” Ortiz told me.
From Slate • Apr. 6, 2026
Beijing got an inkling that Trump thought more transactionally about Taiwan than his predecessors in 2017, during his first state visit to China.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 26, 2026
In his 2024 memoir, Clinton wrote that he "had always thought Epstein was odd but had no inkling of the crimes he was committing".
From BBC • Feb. 26, 2026
I got some inkling of this from Anatole long ago, I suppose, when he explained why he translated Father’s sermons.
From "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver
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.
