English Explanatory Dictionary

nitpick

English dictionary entry

Meanings

verb

To correct insignificant mistakes or find fault in unimportant details.
To pick nits (lice eggs) from someone’s hair.
To pick nits (lice eggs) from someone’s hair. I nitpicked his hair.
I nitpicked his hair.

Pronunciation

/ˈnɪt.pɪk/ en-us-nitpick.ogg en-au-nitpick.ogg

Word forms

nitpick nitpicks nitpicking nitpicked

Etymology

From nit + pick, originally referring to literally removing invisibly tiny louse eggs by hand.

Synonyms

cavil flyspeck

Related words

nitpicker nit-picking nitpickish nitpicky quibble split hairs

Derived words

Britpick nitpickery nutpick

Translations

Danish: fluekneppe Dutch: vlooien Finnish: nyppiä loisia Finnish: saivarrella French: chercher les poux German: lausen Japanese: シラミを取る Macedonian: пошти Portuguese: catar piolho Romanian: păduchea Romanian: despăduchea Serbo-Croatian: биштати Serbo-Croatian: бискати Serbo-Croatian: bištati Serbo-Croatian: biskati

This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.

Back to search All on N Russian dictionary Dahl dictionary