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What is a voyeur?
Voyeur is a fairly recent addition to English; our earliest written evidence for the word dates from the beginning of the 20th century. It comes directly from a French noun meaning, literally, “one who sees.”
Initially, voyeur referred to someone who derived sexual pleasure from watching others undress or engage in intimate acts; it was synonymous with Peeping Tom. By the middle of the 20th century, its meaning had broadened to "an unduly prying observer," particularly one interested in squalid or shocking details:
[A] good biographer is always in some sense a voyeur.–Times Literary Supplement, November 5, 1971
Is a press that pries into a presidential aspirant’s personal habits pandering to voyeurs or enlightening rightfully curious voters? –Saturday Review, February 16, 1980
Examples of voyeur in a Sentence
Ryan Lattanzio, IndieWire, 31 Aug. 2025
Condoning voyeurs while blaming the victims Attitudes in China remain conservative, often to the detriment of women – such as in cases of divorce, domestic violence or upskirting, which aren’t typically treated as a priority by police, rights campaigners have long complained.
—Cnn Staff 20 Hr Ago, CNN Money, 24 Aug. 2025
The through line is the author’s refusal to look at the Brotherhood from the outside in; Riley isn’t some voyeur watching a house on a summer night just after the lights come on.
—Hillary Kelly, The Atlantic, 20 Aug. 2025
Painters across the centuries have turned this most intimate of transgressions into art, inviting viewers to become voyeurs of passion, guilt and desire.
—Smithsonian Magazine, 29 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for voyeur
Cite this Entry
“Voyeur.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/voyeur. Accessed 11 Sep. 2025.
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