audacity

American  

[aw-das-i-tee] / ɔˈdæs ɪ ti /

noun

• audacities
  plural

1. boldness or daring, especially with confident or arrogant disregard for personal safety, conventional thought, or other restrictions.

   Synonyms:

   foolhardiness, temerity, grit, spunk, nerve

   Antonyms:

   prudence, discretion

2. effrontery or insolence; shameless boldness.

   His questioner's audacity shocked the lecturer.

   Synonyms:

   brashness, impertinence, impudence

   Antonyms:

   discretion, prudence

3. Usually audacities audacious or particularly bold or daring acts or statements.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• audacities
  plural

Etymology

Origin of audacity

First recorded in 1400–50; late Middle English audacite, equivalent to Latin audāc- (stem of audāx “bold, daring”) + -ity

Explanation

If you have audacity then you're one daring — and perhaps reckless — character. Running a red light with three previous tickets under your belt certainly shows audacity. And stupidity. The noun audacity developed from the Latin word audacitas, which means “boldness." So someone who shows audacity makes bold moves — and isn't afraid of the consequences. Audacity can be admired or frowned upon, depending how far it's taken and how it rears its head. But as former British Prime Minister and novelist Benjamin Disraeli once said, “Success is the child of audacity.”

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

audacity audacities

This was shockingly unbookish behavior made worse by flabbergasting audacity.

From Salon ● Jul. 7, 2026

Watching that Rosetta Stone-cold stupid footage here, you’re struck not only by his audacity, but by the scene’s excruciating comic pacing.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 26, 2026

You almost have to admire GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen’s audacity in saying he wants to turn his company into an Amazon competitor by acquiring a firm multiples of its size.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 4, 2026

Mr. Armitage’s resplendent translation, proceeding with nerve, wisdom and necessary audacity, proves that literature does not progress so much as deepen, circling the same obsessions with ever-renewed urgency.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 24, 2026

It was a statement astounding for its audacity.

From "Seabiscuit: An American Legend" by Laura Hillenbrand

Watching “The Goldfinch,” I found myself fantasizing about one of the possible audacities that the movie, absent Theo’s unifying voice, could have hazarded.

From The New Yorker ● Sep. 18, 2019

Besides a light show with a simulated jungle made by hundreds of floor-to-ceiling twisty elastic bands, their presentation didn’t rely on expensive mechanical audacities; it resorted to what the program described as an “analogue inventiveness.”

From Washington Post ● Aug. 5, 2016

In short, without Cassavetes both New Hollywood and the recent outpouring of zero-budget independent audacities would be unimaginable.

From The New Yorker ● Jul. 15, 2016

An astounded Paris critic summed up his achievement: "Charles Ives seems to have created, before the Sacre du Printemps, a style which by its audacities places its author among the pioneers of music."

From Time Magazine Archive

He saw that beneath all the audacities of her mind and irregularities of life there was a noble nature, which the circumstances of her birth and training had never permitted true expression.

From Women of England by Bartlett Burleigh James

Related Words

• chutzpah
• gall
• guts
• spunk