pry
verb/praɪ/
/praɪ/
Verb Forms
| present simple I / you / we / they pry | /praɪ/ /praɪ/ |
| he / she / it pries | /praɪz/ /praɪz/ |
| past simple pried | /praɪd/ /praɪd/ |
| past participle pried | /praɪd/ /praɪd/ |
| -ing form prying | /ˈpraɪɪŋ/ /ˈpraɪɪŋ/ |
- [intransitive] pry (into something) to try to find out information about other people’s private lives in a way that is annoying or rude
- I'm sick of you prying into my personal life!
- I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry.
- She tried to keep the children away from the prying eyes of the world's media.
Definitions on the go
Look up any word in the dictionary offline, anytime, anywhere with the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary app.
- (especially North American English) (also prise especially in British English, North American English prize)to use force to separate something from something else
Word Originsense 1 Middle English (in the sense ‘peer inquisitively’): of unknown origin.sense 2 early 19th cent.: from the verb prise, interpreted as pries, third person singular of the present tense.
Check pronunciation:
pry