Deceiving

dɪˈsiːvɪŋ

verbIntermediate📊CommonAction
1 meaning3 questions

Definitions

1

Present participle of the verb deceive. To cause someone to believe something that is not true, typically in order to gain some advantage.

dɪˈsiːvɪŋ

verbnegativeIntermediate
Action

Present participle of deceive.

The magician was deceiving the audience with his clever illusions.

💡 Simply: It's like playing a trick on someone to make them think something that's not really true. For example, if you pretend you're sick to get out of school, you're deceiving the teacher.

👶 For kids: When you're deceiving, it's like you're tricking someone into believing something that's not true.

More Examples

2

She was deceiving her parents about her whereabouts.

3

The advertisements were often deceiving consumers about the product's effectiveness.

How It's Used

General

"He is deceiving his wife."

Law

"Deceiving a customer is illegal."

Synonyms & Antonyms

Synonyms

From Middle English *disceiven*, from Old French *deceivre* ('to deceive'), from Latin *decipere* ('to ensnare, deceive'), from *de-* ('from, away') + *capere* ('to take').

Used in literature and everyday speech since the Middle Ages, with frequent usage in discussions about truth and falsehood.

Memory tip

Imagine a magician using clever tricks to deceive the audience into believing in magic. Deceiving is the act of performing these tricks.

Word Origin

LanguageLatin
Original meaning

"to ensnare, deceive"

deceiving behaviordeceiving appearancedeceiving tactics

Common misspellings

deceivingdeseivingdesieving

Usage

40%Spoken
60%Written