The present research examined the consequences of telling young children they have a reputation for being smart. Of interest was how this would affect their willingness to resist the temptation to cheat for personal gain as assessed by a temptation resistance task, in which children promised not to cheat in the game. Two studies with 3‐ and 5‐year‐old children (total N = 323) assessed this possibility. In Study 1, participants were assigned to one of three conditions: a smart reputation condition in which they were told they have a reputation for being smart, an irrelevant reputation control condition, or a no reputation control condition. Children in the smart reputation condition were significantly more likely to cheat than their counterparts in either control condition. Study 2 confirmed that reputational concerns are indeed a fundamental part of our smart reputation effect. These results suggest that children as young as 3 years of age are able to use reputational cues to guide their behavior, and that telling young children they have a positive reputation for being smart can have negative consequences. Graphical AbstractThe contents of this page will be used as part of the graphical abstract of html only. It will not be published as part of main. The current research examined whether telling young children they have a reputation for being smart affects cheating. Three‐ and 5‐year‐olds who were told they had such a reputation were more likely to cheat on a temptation resistance task than were their counterparts assigned to control conditions. The results are the first to show that telling children they have a reputation for being smart promotes cheating, and that even 3‐year‐olds are responsive to reputational cues.