Telly

//ˈtɛli// adj, noun, slang

adj, noun, slang ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Television. Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, colloquial, countable, uncountable

    "Not much on telly tonight, as usual!"

  2. 2
    A hotel or motel. Canada, US, slang

    "I'm staying at the telly this weekend."

  3. 3
    an electronic device that receives television signals and displays them on a screen wordnet
  4. 4
    A television set. Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, colloquial, countable, uncountable

    "We've got a new flat-screen telly."

  5. 5
    Telegraph. Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, colloquial, countable, uncountable
Show 3 more definitions
  1. 6
    Telephone. Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, colloquial, countable, uncountable
  2. 7
    Teleport. Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, colloquial, countable, uncountable
  3. 8
    Telecommunication. Commonwealth, Ireland, UK, colloquial, countable, uncountable
Adjective
  1. 1
    Inclined to telling (by explicitly stating facts), instead of showing (by conveying an impression so that events are described in the narrative). informal

    "I think my problem with it is that it's a) a little "telly" not "showy" in comparison to the rest […]"

Synonyms

All synonyms
tvboob tubeboxboxgoggle boxidiot box

Example

More examples

"I've already watched this film on the telly."

Etymology

Etymology 1

Shortened form of tele(vision) + -y.

Etymology 2

Shortened form of (ho)tel and/or (mo)tel + -y.

Etymology 3

From tell + -y, related to the writing advice show, don't tell.

Related phrases

telly tennis

More for "telly"

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