What does "street-smart" mean?

Having practical rather than theoretical knowledge, like that learned on the streets rather than in the classroom.

What is a synonym for "street-smart"?

Common synonyms include: clever, street smart, streetwise, with-it, worldly.

Street-smart

adj

adj ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Adjective

1
Having practical rather than theoretical knowledge, like that learned on the streets rather than in the classroom.
"im street smarter than him yo"

Adjective

1
having the shrewd resourcefulness needed to survive in an urban environment wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

clever street smart streetwise with-it worldly

Example

More examples

"For Liverpool, it capped six days of desperate disappointment after missing out on the Premier League to Manchester City by a single point then losing to this experienced, street-smart Real team."

Etymology

Back-formation from street smarts.

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