What it means
A go-to insult for someone being a right idiot, selfish, or just generally unbearable. It can be playful banter between mates, or proper venom when someone’s pushed it too far. Literally it means someone who wanks, but in everyday chat it’s mostly about calling out someone’s behaviour. Short, punchy, and endlessly versatile.
Usage examples
"Some wanker in a white van cut me up on the North Circular then leant on his horn like I’d done him wrong. Proper wanker."
"Some absolute wanker parked across two bays at the pub car park and then complained loudly that the kitchen had run out of scampi. Karma served the dessert."
"Stop being a wanker about the group photo, mate, just stand next to your sister for ten seconds, she has flown from Auckland and your hair is fine, honestly."
Where it comes from
Wanker bolted into British English in the mid twentieth century, off the back of the older verb wank, itself surfacing in dictionaries of slang in the nineteen-forties. The verb described the literal act, but the noun quickly went figurative, picking up the meaning of pillock, idiot, all-round bellend who probably cuts in queues. By the seventies it was on every pub car park, terrace chant and sitcom script in the British isles.
Other ways to say it
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