adj, slang ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Adjective

1. 1
   Annoying, troublesome, irritating (usually of an animal or child). informal

   "Stay out of my yard, you pesky kids!"

Adjective

1. 1
   causing irritation or annoyance wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

annoyingpestiferoustroublesomeaggravatingaggravatingaggy

Example

More examples

"There's a pesky wrinkle on my shirt that I just can't get the iron to remove."

Etymology

Possibly from pesty. Compare similar alteration between nasty and nasky.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.