- (of people) nervous or embarrassed about meeting and speaking to other people synonym timid
- He is not exactly the shy and retiring type.
- Don't be shy—come and say hello.
- She was too shy to ask anyone for help.
- As a teenager I was painfully shy.
- shy around/with somebody She's very shy with adults.
- a quiet, shy man
Extra ExamplesTopics Personal qualitiesb1, Feelingsb1- She was terribly shy around strangers.
- She went all shy and hid behind her mother.
- You don't have to be shy with me, you know.
- She felt suddenly shy as the large crowd fell silent.
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryverbs- be
- feel
- look
- …
- extremely
- fairly
- very
- …
- around
- of
- with
- …
- showing that somebody is nervous or embarrassed about meeting and speaking to other people
- a shy smile
- a shy grin/glance
- his shy demeanour/temperament
- (of animals) easily frightened and not willing to come near people
- The panda is a shy creature.
- [not before noun] (used especially in negative sentences) afraid of doing something or being involved in something
- shy of/about something The band has never been shy of publicity.
- shy of/about doing something He disliked her and had never been shy about saying so.
- [not before noun] shy (of something) (especially North American English, informal) not having quite the amount that is needed to be something or to reach a particular figure
- We are still two players shy (of a full team).
- He died before Christmas, only a month shy of his 90th birthday.
- The bill was just shy of $1 million.
- -shy(in compounds) avoiding or not liking the thing mentioned
- camera-shy (= not liking to be photographed)
- media-shy (= not liking to be photographed, filmed or interviewed by the media)
- He's always been work-shy.
Word OriginOld English scēoh ‘(of a horse) easily frightened’, of Germanic origin; related to German scheuen ‘shun’, scheuchen ‘scare’; compare with eschew. The verb dates from the mid 17th cent.
Idioms
See shy in the Oxford Advanced American DictionarySee shy in the Oxford Learner's Dictionary of Academic Englishfight shy of something/of doing something
- to be unwilling to accept something or do something, and to try to avoid it
- Successive governments have fought shy of such measures.
once bitten, twice shy
- (saying) after an unpleasant experience you are careful to avoid something similar
Check pronunciation:
shy