"rough around the edges" meaning in English

See rough around the edges in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Adjective

Audio: En-au-rough around the edges.ogg [Australia] Forms: rougher around the edges [comparative], roughest around the edges [superlative], rough round the edges [alternative], rough-around-the-edges [alternative]
Head templates: {{en-adj|+first|head=rough around the edges}} rough around the edges (comparative rougher around the edges, superlative roughest around the edges)
  1. (idiomatic) In need of refinement; unsophisticated. Tags: idiomatic Related terms: rough edges, rough and ready Translations (in need of refinement): 粗中有細 /粗中有细 (Chinese Mandarin), hiomaton (Finnish), brut de décoffrage (French), smussare gli angoli (Italian), niedoskonały (Polish), nieoszlifowany (Polish), грубоватый (grubovatyj) (Russian), tosco (Spanish)

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "rougher around the edges",
      "tags": [
        "comparative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "roughest around the edges",
      "tags": [
        "superlative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "rough round the edges",
      "tags": [
        "alternative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "rough-around-the-edges",
      "tags": [
        "alternative"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "+first",
        "head": "rough around the edges"
      },
      "expansion": "rough around the edges (comparative rougher around the edges, superlative roughest around the edges)",
      "name": "en-adj"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
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        {
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          "name": "Personality",
          "orig": "en:Personality",
          "parents": [],
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        }
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        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              6,
              28
            ]
          ],
          "text": "While rough around the edges, the church is really a wonderful place to be.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              44,
              67
            ]
          ],
          "text": "The north side of town is a less expensive, rougher round the edges choice for a young family.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              36,
              58
            ]
          ],
          "text": "His writing is appealing, but a bit rough around the edges.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              17,
              39
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2026 March 20, Gooseworx, “hjsakldfhl” (19:55 from the start), in The Amazing Digital Circus, episode 8, spoken by Kinger (Sean Chiplock):",
          "text": "Caine was pretty rough around the edges, though. I wasn't quite on Scratch's level of thinking outside the box, but it was good groundwork for something the rest of the team could wrap their heads around.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "In need of refinement; unsophisticated."
      ],
      "id": "en-rough_around_the_edges-en-adj-HIutKtMq",
      "links": [
        [
          "refinement",
          "refinement"
        ],
        [
          "unsophisticated",
          "unsophisticated"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) In need of refinement; unsophisticated."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "rough edges"
        },
        {
          "word": "rough and ready"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "cmn",
          "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
          "lang_code": "cmn",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "粗中有細 /粗中有细"
        },
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "lang_code": "fi",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "hiomaton"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "lang_code": "fr",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "brut de décoffrage"
        },
        {
          "code": "it",
          "lang": "Italian",
          "lang_code": "it",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "smussare gli angoli"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "lang_code": "pl",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "niedoskonały"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "lang_code": "pl",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "nieoszlifowany"
        },
        {
          "code": "ru",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "lang_code": "ru",
          "roman": "grubovatyj",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "грубоватый"
        },
        {
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "lang_code": "es",
          "sense": "in need of refinement",
          "word": "tosco"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
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      "audio": "En-au-rough around the edges.ogg",
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      "tags": [
        "Australia"
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  "word": "rough around the edges"
}
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "rougher around the edges",
      "tags": [
        "comparative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "roughest around the edges",
      "tags": [
        "superlative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "rough round the edges",
      "tags": [
        "alternative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "rough-around-the-edges",
      "tags": [
        "alternative"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "+first",
        "head": "rough around the edges"
      },
      "expansion": "rough around the edges (comparative rougher around the edges, superlative roughest around the edges)",
      "name": "en-adj"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "rough edges"
    },
    {
      "word": "rough and ready"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
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        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
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        "English terms with quotations",
        "English terms with usage examples",
        "Entries with translation boxes",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries",
        "Terms with Finnish translations",
        "Terms with French translations",
        "Terms with Italian translations",
        "Terms with Mandarin translations",
        "Terms with Polish translations",
        "Terms with Russian translations",
        "Terms with Spanish translations",
        "en:Personality"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              6,
              28
            ]
          ],
          "text": "While rough around the edges, the church is really a wonderful place to be.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              44,
              67
            ]
          ],
          "text": "The north side of town is a less expensive, rougher round the edges choice for a young family.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              36,
              58
            ]
          ],
          "text": "His writing is appealing, but a bit rough around the edges.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              17,
              39
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2026 March 20, Gooseworx, “hjsakldfhl” (19:55 from the start), in The Amazing Digital Circus, episode 8, spoken by Kinger (Sean Chiplock):",
          "text": "Caine was pretty rough around the edges, though. I wasn't quite on Scratch's level of thinking outside the box, but it was good groundwork for something the rest of the team could wrap their heads around.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "In need of refinement; unsophisticated."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "refinement",
          "refinement"
        ],
        [
          "unsophisticated",
          "unsophisticated"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) In need of refinement; unsophisticated."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
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      "tags": [
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  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "cmn",
      "lang": "Chinese Mandarin",
      "lang_code": "cmn",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "粗中有細 /粗中有细"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "lang_code": "fi",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "hiomaton"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "lang_code": "fr",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "brut de décoffrage"
    },
    {
      "code": "it",
      "lang": "Italian",
      "lang_code": "it",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "smussare gli angoli"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "lang_code": "pl",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "niedoskonały"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "lang_code": "pl",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "nieoszlifowany"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "lang_code": "ru",
      "roman": "grubovatyj",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "грубоватый"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "lang_code": "es",
      "sense": "in need of refinement",
      "word": "tosco"
    }
  ],
  "word": "rough around the edges"
}

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This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-08-02 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-07-06 using wiktextract (d9fa233 and 9e92f4b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.