The Varied Meanings of Sketchy

A sketch is a rough drawing usually done as an initial draft in contrast to a finished work. The word sketch suggests imperfection and a lack of refinement. It comes from the Dutch word schets and ultimately from the Italian verb schizzare, an imitative verb meaning "to splash."

Unsurprisingly, the adjective sketchy originally described something relating to or resembling a sketch, as in "a sketchy portrait." But because sketches are by nature rough and ill-defined, sketchy soon came to mean "wanting in completeness, clearness, or substance," as in "a sketchy understanding" or "sketchy details."

What lacks completeness, clearness, or substance is also subject to doubt or challenge, and sketchy went on to develop uses applying to what is questionable or iffy, either for physically obvious qualities or for something less tangible. In sports we see this sense of sketchy applied to a track or surface that is poorly maintained, as in "a sketchy track," and in broader use it is applied to streets and neighborhoods that can also be described as seedy, as in "a sketchy part of town."

The adjective has more recently extended in use to describe someone who creates an impression of unsavoriness, or something that comes from an untrustworthy source or is itself untrustworthy, as in "a sketchy dude" or "a scheme that sounds sketchy."

Examples of sketchy in a Sentence

The details about the accident are still a little sketchy. I have only a sketchy idea of how it works.

Recent Examples on the Web Treatments have been sketchy in their effectiveness, but in 2014 a doctor suggested a stringent elimination diet for three months. — San Diego Union-Tribune, 28 July 2021 Avoid involvement in anything that seems sketchy and could backfire. — Tribune Content Agency, oregonlive, 25 July 2021 Jason Kidd didn’t provide much insight into lessons learned from sketchy tours as a head coach in Brooklyn or Milwaukee, let alone his personal growth since pleading guilty to assaulting his former wife in 2001. — Kevin Sherrington, Dallas News, 15 July 2021 Hopefully the company figures out its tablets plan soon — for now, the only way to access the service on iPads and Android tablets is through a slew of sketchy third-party apps. — Washington Post, 14 July 2021 Inspired by the early D&D monster manuals, the set features 51 creatures with a sketchy, parchment-y art style that looks like a more extreme continuation of the sketch cards introduced in Modern Horizons 2. — Joe Parlock, Forbes, 24 June 2021 The neighborhood was funky, and even a bit sketchy, but their four sons and grandchildren were happy to drop by, and the beach was their playground. — Steve Lopez Columnist, Los Angeles Times, 5 June 2021 The exact toll of the massacre is still a bit sketchy, much like the faded and yellowed photos that attempt to document the events that took place 100 years ago. — Lee Anna A. Jackson, Essence, 26 May 2021 Yet the hero’s journey in the original movies was always sketchy. — Spencer Kornhaber, The Atlantic, 21 June 2021

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'sketchy.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.