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canny

[kan-ee] / ˈkæn i /


Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

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And yet there was still a sense that Hollywood underserved her canny ability to appear both ferocious and vulnerable, whether as a horror heroine in “Scream 4” or a superpowered cheerleader on “Heroes.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 17, 2026

But the pair are just the latest in the long line of hustlers, fraudsters and canny opportunists who have been working to undermine science in this country for more than a century.

From Salon ● Aug. 13, 2026

Shorn of the suspended Ramsey and Davies, Wales were stifled by their canny opponents, who secured a 2-0 win with second-half goals from Cristiano Ronaldo and Nani.

From BBC ● Aug. 4, 2026

It will take more than stolen KitKats and canny marketing to turn the company around.

From Barron's ● Jun. 10, 2026

But she smiles her canny little smile in a way that makes me think it’s not a bad notion.

From "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America" by Barbara Ehrenreich

The book reveals negotiations over public funding for the royals when the Sovereign Grant was introduced in 2012 - and presents the Palace as cannier about money than their counterparts in Westminster.

From BBC ● Sep. 2, 2025

But it would have been cannier of Barnes to make her a genuinely convincing provocateur.

From New York Times ● Aug. 17, 2022

He needs to be a much cannier person and not show his lining too much.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 25, 2020

In this relationship, she’s the cannier and the crueler.

From Slate ● Aug. 8, 2019

She thought of those cannier, less docile hens and laughed.

From Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise by David Graham Phillips

Wolfson is widely considered to be one of the canniest operators in UK retail and NEXT's significant on-line business has helped the company weather the assault of e-commerce on traditional retail.

From BBC ● Feb. 18, 2021

But control is just one effect, and in some ways the canniest — nothing else so efficiently earns the reader’s trust and can lull her into sleepy credulity.

From New York Times ● Jan. 19, 2021

One of the canniest things about the Wick films is how they riff on Reeves’ public image.

From The Guardian ● May 18, 2019

But Sarah isn't about to relinquish her grip on either her sanity or her fortune, and Mirren, among the canniest of screen actors, supplies a rational impulse for her every Miss Havisham-like eccentricity.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 2, 2018

In the north part of Bechuanaland are the self-governing Bamangwato and the Batwana, the former ruled by Khama, one of the canniest of modern rulers in Africa.

From The Negro by W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt) Du Bois




Vocabulary lists containing canny


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