goody two shoes
"goody-two-shoes" is a 13-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“goody two shoes” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 15
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A goody-goody; a person who is almost always perfectly well-behaved, with an implication of smugness.
Corpus desk
Index EN-goody-two-shoes · goody two shoes · English
goody two shoes · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 15 letters
- VOW-6 6 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "G" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | goody two shoes |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 15 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “goody two shoes” in English
Rare enough to double-check
goody two shoes is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A goody-goody; a person who is almost always perfectly well-behaved, with an implication of smugness.".
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for goody two shoes, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. Our dataset records no confusable match here, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
Etymologically, the entry records: From goody (“goodwife, obsolete title of respect for a woman”) + two + shoes. Generally considered to have originated with the title character in The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes (1765), which indeed seems to be the source of its later use as a common … The correct English form is goody two shoes, spelled G-O-O-D-Y- -T-W-O- -S-H-O-E-S.
Definition
- 1A goody-goody; a person who is almost always perfectly well-behaved, with an implication of smugness.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how goody two shoes appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
[…] When jabbed by ethicists, he at first asserted, "I'm not Goody Two-Shoes," before acknowledging a minor lapse.
[Jeremy Hunt] is charming, thoughtful and amusing in private, and one ally said he was "almost a goody two shoes".
Etymology
From goody (“goodwife, obsolete title of respect for a woman”) + two + shoes. Generally considered to have originated with the title character in The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes (1765), which indeed seems to be the source of its later use as a common noun with the present meaning. However, as a proper noun with implications of wealth rather than goodness, it is also found earlier, c. 1687, in the writings of Charles Cotton: “Why, what then; Goody Two-Shoes, what if it be? / Hold you, if you can, your tittle-tattle, quoth he.”
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.