unruly.

Resisting control, discipline, or orderly arrangement.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• an unruly crowd
• unruly hair

On the page

The unruly crowd spilled past the rope before the speaker arrived.

An unruly curl escaped every attempt to pin it beneath the cap.

Usage notes

Primary category: literary. Forms: Comparative more unruly; superlative most unruly where gradation is meaningful. Legacy lexical fields mirror sense 1 only. Use numbered sense fields for all meanings.