secretive

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English secretife, equivalent to secret +‎ -ive.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈsiːkɹɪtɪv/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (weak vowel merger) IPA^(key): /ˈsiːkɹətɪv/

Adjective

secretive (comparative more secretive, superlative most secretive)

1. Having an inclination to secrecy.

   She's a secretive girl, not giving away much about her life.

   Why are you acting all secretive? What are you hiding?

   • 1987, Christina Hardyment, “Picking up Gold and Silver”, in Heidi’s Alp: One Family’s Search for Storybook Europe, Book Club edition, New York, N.Y.: The Atlantic Monthly Press, →OCLC, page 100:

     Sitting back on a bench in the sunshine, Tom and I began to catch up with each other while the girls arranged their surprises at the remotest picnic table in the lay-by. Genial lorry drivers, munching wurst high in their cabs, looking down on their secretive toing and froing with interest.

   • 2025 July 17, Oliver Holmes, “Trump calls Epstein conspiracy a ‘hoax’ and turns on Maga ‘weaklings’”, in The Guardian‎^[1], archived from the original on 10 August 2025:

     Donald Trump has lashed out against his own supporters, calling them gullible “weaklings” for questioning the transparency of a secretive government inquiry into the late high-profile socialite and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Synonyms

• furtive
• sly
• See also Thesaurus:covert

Derived terms

• hypersecretive
• nonsecretive
• secretively
• secretiveness
• semisecretive
• supersecretive
• unsecretive

Translations

having an inclination to secrecy

• Albanian: tinzar, tinëzar (sq)
• Arabic: كَتُوم (katūm), مُتَحَفِّظ (mutaḥaffiẓ), مُتَكَتِّم (mutakattim)

  Egyptian Arabic: please add this translation if you can

• Armenian: գաղտնապահ (hy) (gaġtnapah), ծածկամիտ (hy) (cackamit)
• Azerbaijani: please add this translation if you can
• Bulgarian: потаен (bg) (potaen)
• Catalan: reservat
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 保密的 (bǎo mì dē)

• Czech: tajnůstkářský m, sekreční (cs)
• Danish: hemmelighedsfuld (da)
• Dutch: geheimzinnig (nl), gesloten (nl), gereserveerd (nl)
• Esperanto: kaŝema
• Finnish: salaperäinen (fi)
• French: secret (fr) (nature), cachottier (fr) (behaviour)
• German: verschlossen (de), heimlichtuerisch
• Greek: κρυφός (el) m (kryfós)
• Hebrew: חשאי (he) m (khashaí), נוטה לסודיות m (noté lesodiyút)
• Hindi: please add this translation if you can
• Hungarian: titokzatos (hu), titkolózó (hu)
• Icelandic: please add this translation if you can
• Latvian: noslēpumains
• Lithuanian: slapùs
• Māori: whakakumu
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: hemmelighetsfull

• Persian: please add this translation if you can
• Polish: skryty (pl) m, tajemniczy (pl) m
• Portuguese: reservado (pt)
• Romanian: secretos (ro)
• Russian: скры́тный (ru) (skrýtnyj), за́мкнутый (ru) (zámknutyj)
• Serbo-Croatian: please add this translation if you can
• Slovak: please add this translation if you can
• Spanish: reservado (es), secretista, hermético (es), misterioso (es), secretivo (rare, Spain)
• Swedish: hemlighetsfull (sv)
• Turkish: please add this translation if you can
• Urdu: please add this translation if you can

Etymology 2

Etymology tree

English secrete

Proto-Indo-European *-wós

Proto-Indo-European *-iHwósder.

Latin -īvus

Old French -ifbor.

Middle English -yf

English -ive

English secretive

From secrete + -ive.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /səˈkɹiːtɪv/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

Adjective

secretive (not comparable)

1. Relating to secretion.

Anagrams

• receivest, resective

Italian

Adjective

secretive

1. feminine plural of secretivo

Anagrams

• escretive, riceveste