betray
verb
Simple meaning
To prove faithless or treacherous to, as to a trust or someone who trusts.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
bihtraySay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
bɪtˈɹeɪ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
verb
transitive
To prove faithless or treacherous to, as to a trust or one who trusts; to be false to; to deceive.
transitive
To violate the confidence of, by disclosing a secret, or that which one is bound in honor not to make known.
transitive
To deliver into the hands of an enemy by treachery or fraud, in violation of trust; to give up treacherously or faithlessly.
transitive
To disclose or indicate, for example something which prudence would conceal; to reveal unintentionally.
“Her smile betrayed her true feelings.”
transitive
To disclose (a secret, etc.) in deliberate violation of someone's confidence.
transitive
To mislead; to expose to inconvenience not foreseen; to lead into error or sin.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient
- Frequency
- Uncommon
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: To prove faithless or treacherous to, as to a trust or one who trusts; to be false to; to deceive.
Used this way, betray is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It criticises, but without shouting.
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Serious and weighty
- Usage feel
- Critical but measured
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use betray
- “Her smile betrayed her true feelings.”verb
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.