Meaning & use
niggling
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Meaning
adjectivebefore a noun
Small but annoying or worrying, and difficult to stop thinking about.
Grammar: Almost always comes before a noun: a niggling doubt; not 'the doubt was niggling'.
Patterns
- a niggling doubt
- a niggling worry about something
A niggling doubt kept her awake all night.
He had a niggling pain in his left knee after the run.
There were a few niggling problems with the new software.
Common combinations
- niggling doubt
- A niggling doubt made him check the door again.
- niggling worry
- The niggling worry never quite went away.
- niggling injury
- The striker missed the game with a niggling injury.
- niggling feeling
- She had a niggling feeling that she had forgotten something.
- niggling problem
- The team fixed a few niggling problems before the launch.
Synonyms and how they differ
- nagging
- Nagging suggests something that keeps returning and demands attention, and can be a little stronger than niggling.
- persistent
- Persistent only says something continues, without the idea that it is small and irritating.
- trivial
- Trivial says something is unimportant but does not imply it keeps bothering you.
- irksome
- Irksome is more formal and describes anything mildly annoying, even when it is not worrying.
Opposites
Word family
Commonly confused: niggling or nagging?
niggling vs nagging
Nagging is used for both things and people who keep complaining, while niggling mostly describes small doubts or pains.
Practice
Which noun would most naturally follow 'niggling'?
Choose one answer.
A niggling doubt is a small worry that will not go away. An earthquake is serious, and celebration and victory are not annoying.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “niggling”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.