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rogue

noun · adjective

Simple meaning

A scoundrel, rascal or unprincipled, deceitful, and unreliable person.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

rohg
US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈɹoʊɡ

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.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. A scoundrel, rascal or unprincipled, deceitful, and unreliable person.

  2. A mischievous scamp.

  3. A vagrant.

  4. An aggressive animal separate from the herd, especially an elephant.

  5. A plant that shows some undesirable variation.

adjective

  1. by extension

    Large, destructive and unpredictable.

  2. Mischievous, unpredictable.

  3. by extension

    Deceitful, unprincipled.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
B2 · Upper Intermediate
Frequency
Moderately Common
Typical Use
Neutral / general English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: A scoundrel, rascal or unprincipled, deceitful, and unreliable person.

Used this way, rogue is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It criticises, but without shouting.

Emotional tone
Negative
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Gentle
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Serious and weighty
Usage feel
Critical but measured

Nearby words

  • varlet , rarer, so it draws attention

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

More ways to use rogue

  • “A rogue wave crashed unexpectedly over the side of the boat.”

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Aggressive

rogue elephant

Large

rogue riverrogue wave

Other combinations

rogue stateyoung roguegreat rogueenglish roguesome rogue

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • rogue elephantnounCompound term

    A wild and vicious elephant separated from the herd.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: scoundrel or rascal or unprincipled or deceitful

rascalvarletRare

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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.