1
as in to negotiate
to plan out usually with subtle skill or care
let me look at my schedule and see if I can't finagle a visit to the museum
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in to cheat
to use dishonest methods to achieve a goal
she'll finagle until she gets exactly what she wants
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of finagle
This whole thing seems staged, planned, finagled, massaged, bamboozled, lollygagged, and all sorts of other long, silly-sounding words that may not necessarily apply to this situation.
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Brian Moylan, Vulture, 7 Aug. 2025
Can’t finagle a flight to Hawaii right now?
—John Metcalfe, Mercury News, 6 Aug. 2025
Having finagled an invite from Prater’s steely assistant, Charley (Uma Thurman, sporting an asymmetrical bob and a disgusted glower), Dexter infiltrates the group looking for villains to bring to his kill table.
—EW.com, 10 July 2025
This, too: though praising FIFA for anything requires pinching one’s nose, the poohbahs were right to finagle Inter Miami into the tournament.
—Tom Krasovic, San Diego Union-Tribune, 29 June 2025
See All Example Sentences for finagle
Recent Examples of Synonyms for finagle
Verb
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Still, the legislative session frequently goes past the target end date as lawmakers negotiate over the final details of bills and the state budget.—
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Players with more than three years of service time can use arbitration to negotiate their salaries for an upcoming season, and Skubal has more than five years in.—
Verb
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The only reason that Bikini Frankenstein does not rank higher on this list is because putting a softcore porno at the top would feel like cheating.—
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But like his predecessor, this Frankenstein is just as obsessed with immortality and cheating death through science.—
Verb
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Despite his level-headedness, Mike is mightily discontent with the low-wattage gigs that are arranged for him by, of all people, his dentist (Fisher Stevens), who soon replaces that absent tooth.—
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As a newcomer to composing and arranging for strings, Simon benefitted greatly by working with a group readily available for consultation and collaboration.—
Verb
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An onboard synthesizer manipulates a small set of core sounds to mimic everything from the roar of a jet plane to the flushing of a toilet through a little speaker in the Brick.—
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In some cases, CBS News ran images through AI detection tools, which can be inconsistent or inaccurate but can still help flag possibly manipulated content.—
Cite this Entry
“Finagle.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/finagle. Accessed 13 Jan. 2026.
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