as in informant
a person who provides information about another's wrongdoing
a canary who was singing and giving up the names of some of the city's most notorious drug lords
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of canary
That principle is why coal miners once brought canaries underground, as one emergency medicine doctor explained in a recent court declaration.
—
Lisa Song, ProPublica, 7 May 2026
If canaries in coal mines were harbingers of safe conditions, surely piping plovers at Waukegan Beach mean the city is overcoming its polluted past.
—Charles Selle, Chicago Tribune, 4 May 2026
Glossy rosettes emerge green and blush rosy when temperatures dips, then burst into canary-yellow flowers emerge in late summer-early fall.
—Erica Browne Grivas, Midwest Living, 4 May 2026
The canary trap is a simple tool often used to identify leakers or double agents.
—Nate Anderson, ArsTechnica, 4 May 2026
See All Example Sentences for canary
Lisa Song, ProPublica, 7 May 2026
If canaries in coal mines were harbingers of safe conditions, surely piping plovers at Waukegan Beach mean the city is overcoming its polluted past.
—Charles Selle, Chicago Tribune, 4 May 2026
Glossy rosettes emerge green and blush rosy when temperatures dips, then burst into canary-yellow flowers emerge in late summer-early fall.
—Erica Browne Grivas, Midwest Living, 4 May 2026
The canary trap is a simple tool often used to identify leakers or double agents.
—Nate Anderson, ArsTechnica, 4 May 2026
See All Example Sentences for canary
Recent Examples of Synonyms for canary
Noun
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Maybe every second man in those crazy groups was an informant.—
Seth Abramovitch,
HollywoodReporter,
20 May 2026
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Sandweg said one of the director's most underappreciated responsibilities is managing that internal fault line, ensuring that ERO's highly visible arrest operations do not undermine HSI's ability to cultivate the confidential informants and foreign partnerships on which its work depends.—
Philip Wang,
Time,
18 May 2026
Noun
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And so every regime invests in having student informers.—
Anne Applebaum,
The Atlantic,
23 Jan. 2026
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The whole family is deeply involved in the revolutionary movement: the oldest son disappears into Siberia, never to be seen or heard of again, while the youngest, eighteen, is jailed together with his father, and executed after his cell is exposed by an informer.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
22 Jan. 2026
Noun
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The colilargo itself has no presence across the Strait of Magellan in Tierra del Fuego, which is believed to be too cold and isolated for the rat.—
ABC News,
ABC News,
19 May 2026
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The first two fatalities, a Dutch couple, were probably infected through exposure to rat droppings while bird-watching in Argentina.—
The Week US,
TheWeek,
18 May 2026
Cite this Entry
“Canary.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/canary. Accessed 24 May. 2026.
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