weak sister

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Meaning · English

A person or thing that is ineffective or incompetent

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

một người hoặc điều gì đó không hiệu quả hoặc không có khả năng

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Literally: a sister who is weak
Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

The company's marketing department is the weak sister of the organization

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

Sources & notes

Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.

Common questions

What does “weak sister” mean?

A person or thing that is ineffective or incompetent Literally: a sister who is weak

Is “weak sister” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.