estafar

Borrowed from Spanish estafar, from Italian staffare.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic) [əs.təˈfa]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [es.taˈfaɾ]
• Rhymes: -a(ɾ)

estafar (first-person singular present estafo, first-person singular preterite estafí, past participle estafat)

1. to scam, swindle

• “estafar”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007
• “estafar” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.
• “estafar”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025.

• Hyphenation: es‧ta‧far

estafar (first-person singular present estafo, first-person singular preterite estafei, past participle estafado)

1. to overload with work, to tire, to weary, to exhaust
2. to beat up, to physically attack
3. to spendthrift, to waste money

Borrowed from Italian staffare (“to lose one's stirrup[s]”), comparing the victim of a fraud to a rider.^[1]

• IPA^(key): /estaˈfaɾ/ [es.t̪aˈfaɾ]
• Rhymes: -aɾ
• Syllabification: es‧ta‧far

estafar (first-person singular present estafo, first-person singular preterite estafé, past participle estafado)

1. (transitive) to swindle, to con

   Synonyms: engañar, timar

2. (transitive) to rip off, to cheat

• The difference between estafar and timar and their corresponding derivatives is that estafar typically has to do with graver offense in conning and swindling than timar does. Estafar is more of an action that you could be potentially arrested for. Keep in mind as always that this can vary regionally, and in some places the two terms may be entirely synonymous.

• → Catalan: estafar

• “estafar”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 10 December 2024