blacklist

1 of 2

noun

black·​list ˈblak-ˌlist 

1

: a list of persons who are disapproved of or are to be punished or boycotted

2

: a list of banned or excluded things of disreputable character

a domain-name blacklist

… helped the government keep marijuana on the blacklist.

—Cynthia Cotts

blacklist

2 of 2

verb

blacklisted; blacklisting; blacklists

transitive verb

: to put on a blacklist

blacklister noun

Examples of blacklist in a Sentence

Noun

He's on the FBI's blacklist.

The rental company has created a blacklist of bad drivers.

Recent Examples on the Web

Noun

Last month, the Pentagon added CATL to its blacklist of companies deemed to be working with the Chinese military, barring it from Department of Defense’s contracts. —John Liu, CNN, 12 Feb. 2025

While China’s Ministry of Commerce began investigating PVH in September for allegedly refusing to source cotton from the Xinjiang region, which has become notorious for its Uyghur detention camps, Beijing officially placed the company on its blacklist on Tuesday. —Gabrielle Fonrouge, CNBC, 6 Feb. 2025

Verb

The company, blacklisted by the U.S. for national security reasons, did not feature among Nvidia’s competitors for at least three prior years. —Evelyn Cheng, CNBC, 27 Feb. 2025

Authorities canceled the rest of the 2023 festival following the band’s performance and blacklisted the group’s members from the country. —Madison Bloom, Pitchfork, 26 Feb. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

Noun

1624, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Verb

1702, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for blacklist

• assist
• booklist
• checklist
• consist
• desist
• dismissed
• enlist
• exist
• insist
• oocyst
• persist
• resist

Kids Definition

blacklist

noun

black·​list

ˈblak-ˌlist

: a list of persons who are disapproved of and are to be punished

blacklist verb