75 Synonyms for Cheat, Fraud, or Trickery

75 Synonyms for Cheat, Fraud, or Trickery 75 Synonyms for â€Å"Cheat,† â€Å"Fraud,† or â€Å"Trickery† 75 Synonyms for â€Å"Cheat,† â€Å"Fraud,† or â€Å"Trickery† By Mark Nichol Human beings have developed cheating, fraud, and trickery into such a high art (or, more accurately, a low one) that, in English at least, we’ve created an extensive and colorful vocabulary to describe such activity. Here is an exhaustive but incomplete list of synonyms in noun and/or verb form for cheat, fraud, and trickery. 1. Bamboozle: to deceive or undermine 2. Beat: to cheat 3. Beguile: to deceive or trick (or to lure) 4. Bilk: one who defrauds; to defraud (or evade or frustrate) 5. Bleed: to be the victim of extortion 6. Blind: see subterfuge 7. Bluff: an act of deception or misdirection; or to undertake such an act 8. Buffalo: to deceive 9. Bunco: a game or scheme designed to cheat someone 10. Burn: to deceive 11. Chicanery: deception 12. Chisel: to engage in unfair practices 13. Chouse: to cheat or trick 14. Con: one who cheats or manipulates, or an act or operation to that end; to cheat or manipulate (from confidence) 15. Cozenage: fraud (the verb form is cozen) 16. Craft: cunning (usually employed in the adjectival form crafty) 17. Crib: a method or device for cheating on a test; to cheat, or to have the habit of cheating, in this manner 18. Diddle: see swindle (verb form only) 19–20. Do (or do in): to cheat 21. Doctor: to alter or modify deceptively 22. Dodge: an act of deceit or a trick; to deceive or trick 23. Dupe: one who fools another, or the act of fooling (as dupery, the act of fooling or the condition of being fooled); to deceive or trick 24. Duplicity: using words or actions to deceive 25. End run: an evasive maneuver or trick 26. Euchre: to cheat or trick (also the name of a card game) 27. Feint: a fake attack or blow intended to distract the target from a real assault; to make such a move 28. Fiddle: see swindle (British English; also, also, to deceive by altering or manipulating) 29. Fix: an act or instance of influencing illegally or improperly; to influence illegally or improperly 30. Fleece: to perpetrate extortion or fraud (or to charge excessively) 31. Flimflam: fraud or deceit; or to subject someone to fraud or deceit 32. Front: an entity ostensibly responsible for something but masking the identity of the entity actually engaging in an endeavor; to act as the masking agent 33. Fudge: to fake or to go beyond the bounds of proper conduct 34. Gammon: deceitful talk; to deceive or fake 35. Gaff: a fraud, trick, or gimmick; to deceive or trick or set up a fraud or trick 36. Gull: one who is easy deceived (the root of gullible); to deceive 37. Gyp: one who cheats or deceives, or an act of cheating or deception; to cheat 38 Have on: to deceive or trick (British English) 39. Hoax: an act of deception, or something intended to deceive; to trick into accepting or believing something false 40. Hose: to cheat or trick 41. Humbug: something intended to deceive, or a deceptive person or attitude (also, nonsense); to deceive 42. Hustle: the act of deception to obtain or sell something; to use deception to obtain or sell something, or to lure others to gamble 43. Jig: a trick 44. Jugglery: deception or trickery; in verb form (juggle), to deceive or trick 45. Legerdemain: to deceive by distraction or misleading (literally, â€Å"sleight of hand†) 46. Mulct: to defraud or obtain by fraud (also, a fine, or to fine) 47. Nobble: to cheat (especially, in British English, by drugging a racehorse) 48. Pluck: see fleece 49. Put on: an act of deception or trickery (the noun form is hyphenated); to deceive or trick 50. Ream: to cheat 51. Rip off: an act of cheating or fraud (the noun form is hyphenated); to cheat or defraud (or to steal or copy) 52. Rook: to defraud 53. Scam: a deceptive or fraudulent act or operation; to deceive or defraud by such action 54. Screw: to extort or trick (also, to pressure or threaten) 55. Shake down: an act of obtaining money deceptively (the noun form is a closed compound); to obtain money deceptively 56. Sham: a trick (also, hypocrisy, or a counterfeit or imitation) 57. Shell game: see thimblerig 58. Short: see shortchange 59. Shortchange: to cheat by giving less than is due, or to cheat in general 60. Skin: see fleece 61. Skulduggery: devious behavior 62. Skunk: to cheat or fail to pay 63. Snooker: to cheat 64. Snow: to deceive (or charm or persuade) 65. Sophistry: argument or reasoning intended to deceive 66. Squeeze: to extort, or obtain by extorting 67. Stick: to cheat or to overcharge or trick into paying more 68. Stiff: to cheat by refusing or failing to pay 69. Sting: an act of cheating or charging excessively; to cheat or charge excessively 70. Subterfuge: trickery to conceal or evade 71. Sucker: one who is easily cheated or deceived; to cheat or deceive 72. Swindle: an act of deception or fraud to obtain something; to obtain something by deceit or fraud 73. Smoke screen: something intended to conceal or deceive 74. Thimblerig: a trick in which a small object is moved among three overturned cups and someone attempts to identify the cup it ends up under, or the person who performs the trick; to cheat this way or in general 75. Wile: a deceitful trick (also, one that is merely clever or playful), or skill in luring or tricking others (in the sense of luring, often plural) Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Vocabulary category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:Cost-Effective vs. Cost-Efficient10 Techniques for More Precise Writing48 Writing Prompts for Middle School Kids