savant
Americannoun
-
savants
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of savant
1710–20; < French: man of learning, scholar, old present participle of savoir to know ≪ Latin sapere to be wise; see sapient
Explanation
You know that girl in your school with a 4.0 GPA? She is a savant in the making. A savant is someone over-the-top smart, a scholar. It might take a savant only five minutes to do an entire math test. Savant is the French word for "learned" and it goes back to the Latin word sapere, "to be wise." In English, a savant can be someone is who is wise and learned in general, or someone who is extremely skilled in a particular area, like your little brother who can rattle off the first three hundred digits of pi.
Vocabulary lists containing savant
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
During an interview with the Zach Sang show in 2024, she spoke about a song called Fantasize, written with Swedish pop savant Max Martin, which went viral after being posted online.
From BBC ● Jul. 28, 2026
OpenAI, wanting to control its own destiny, teamed up with Apple’s former design savant Jony Ive to make its own AI device.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 5, 2026
An Alabama-born engineer seen as a supply-chain savant, Tim Cook took on the daunting challenge of succeeding Apple's iconic boss Steve Jobs 15 years ago.
From Barron's ● Apr. 21, 2026
Young Jim showed an early gift for mathematics that bordered on savant territory.
From MarketWatch ● Nov. 15, 2025
“But this side was jolted awake. It’s called acquired savant syndrome.”
From "The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl" by Stacy McAnulty
Matisse Thybulle says practice is sure to be tougher than games when he gets pushed by offensive savants Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2026
When AI savants are infused with the experience of seasoned professionals, innovation cycles collapse even further.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 22, 2025
One of the league’s pick-and-roll savants, Doncic should help Ayton rediscover the dominance he flashed while helping the Phoenix Suns reach the NBA Finals in 2021 and post a franchise-record 64 wins in 2022.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 30, 2025
“Oh, Mary!” is the kind of instant sensation that’s all too rare these days, one so undeniable it immediately breaks through the crowd of theater savants to a wider audience of curious patrons.
From Salon ● Jun. 9, 2025
Among these savants I will mention the name of the lamented Pierre Curie, the eminent chemist, with whom I had a conversation a few days before his unfortunate and terrible death.
From Mysterious Psychic Forces An Account of the Author's Investigations in Psychical Research, Together with Those of Other European Savants by Camille Flammarion
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
