mégoter
French, verb\me.ɡɔ.te\
mégoter is spelled M-É-G-O-T-E-R (7 letters) and appears about once in every 50 million words in written French, the 223,977th most frequent French word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). Mégoter is a French verb meaning “to be stingy, to nitpick, to skimp” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) defines it as “Négocier sur des détails inutiles (des mégots, métaphoriquement parlant), vouloir économiser mesquinement”.
What does mégoter mean in English?
verb
- 1
to be stingy, to nitpick, to skimp
Source: English Wiktionary, French section, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How French dictionaries define it
verb: 1. Négocier sur des détails inutiles (des mégots, métaphoriquement parlant), vouloir économiser mesquinement.
The definition in the French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), in French.
Source: French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire), dump of September 1, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org.
Forms of mégoter
- avoir + past participle infinitive multiword-construction
- mégotant gerund participle present
- ayant + past participle gerund multiword-construction participle
- mégoté participle past
- mégote first-person indicative present
- mégotes indicative present second-person
- mégotons first-person indicative plural
- mégotez indicative plural present
- mégotent indicative plural present
- mégotais first-person imperfect indicative
- mégotait imperfect indicative singular
- mégotions first-person imperfect indicative
- mégotiez imperfect indicative plural
- mégotaient imperfect indicative plural
- mégotai first-person historic indicative
- mégotas historic indicative past
- mégota historic indicative past
- mégotâmes first-person historic indicative
Source: English Wiktionary and French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026).
How do you pronounce mégoter?
- \me.ɡɔ.te\
Sources: English Wiktionary, French Wiktionary (Wiktionnaire) (dumps of September 2, 2026 and September 1, 2026); recordings from Wikimedia Commons.
English words that translate to mégoter
Source: the translation tables of the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026.
How common is mégoter in French?
mégoter appears about once in every 50 million words in written French.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).