Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

pain in the neck

Word Rarity Uncommon

Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.48 in modern English

Syllables: pain in the -neck
IPA

24

Scrabble Score

13

Letters

2

Syllables

9

Unique Chars

Meaning

noun

Someone or something which is annoying, irritating or inconvenient.

Slang

Example Sentences

"Got to know McTodd, found he wasn’t coming to the castle, and came down instead of him, same as me. Only he got there first, damn him! Wouldn’t that give you a pain in the neck!”"
"OK, call me a hypersensitive liberal, if you want. It wouldn’t be the first time. I can be a pain in the neck about racial, ethnic and religious bias sometimes, but I think it’s better to be hypersensitive than insensitive."

Etymology

First attested in the 1920s.

Origin

First known use: First attested in the 1920s

Usage

Slang

Inflected Forms

pains in the neck (plural)

Frequently Paired Words

trachelodynia

Synonyms

pain in the ass pain in the butt pest nuisance annoyance bother botheration pain infliction

Questions

What does pain in the neck mean?: Someone or something which is annoying, irritating or inconvenient.
Where does pain in the neck come from?: First known use: First attested in the 1920s.

How to pronounce pain in the neck

Open the pronunciation page — Open the Speakur entry for “pain in the neck”.
Read the phonetic spelling — Read the IPA spelling () so you know which sounds to aim for.
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