epitomize
Americanverb (used with object)
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epitomizes,
present (3rd person singular)
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epitomized,
past participle, past
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epitomizing
present participle
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to contain or represent in small compass; serve as a typical example of; typify.
This meadow epitomizes the beauty of the whole area.
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to make an epitome of.
to epitomize an argument.
verb
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to be a personification of; typify
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to make an epitome of
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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epitomizesimple
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epitomizessimple
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have epitomizedperfect
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has epitomizedperfect
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am epitomizingprogressive
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are epitomizingprogressive
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is epitomizingprogressive
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have been epitomizingperfect progressive
-
has been epitomizingperfect progressive
Past
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epitomizedsimple
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had epitomizedperfect
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was epitomizingprogressive
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were epitomizingprogressive
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had been epitomizingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of epitomize
Explanation
If you epitomize something, you’re a perfect example of that thing. If you never get nervous when playing basketball and can always make that last-second shot, your teammates might say you epitomize mental toughness. A person can epitomize something — usually an abstract quality, like grace or greed — but epitomize can apply to other things as well. A popular band might epitomize the spirit of the new decade, which means it has all the main characteristics associated with the era's music, like long folksy beards, pretty harmonies, and earnest lyrics. A frustrating situation at work involving careless coworkers might make you say that they epitomize everything that’s wrong with your job.
Vocabulary lists containing epitomize
The Color of Water
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Into Thin Air
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Harriet Tubman
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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:
The two entrepreneurs came to epitomize a certain swagger of the first hype cycle roughly a decade ago when Silicon Valley was betting it could replace a world of human-driven cars with robots.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 22, 2026
In what is one of the more wide-open playoffs in recent Major League Baseball history, the Dodgers epitomize the relative state of parity.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 30, 2024
More than any other ocean-dwelling creature, they epitomize the movement to save, as the saying goes, wildlife in the ocean.
From Slate ● Feb. 4, 2024
The work going on display was painted by an Ethiopian artist and celebrates the Ethiopian victory in what came to epitomize pan-African independence at a time when European empires were carving up the continent.
From Seattle Times ● May 9, 2023
The time-tested strategy of using those who epitomize moral virtue as symbols in racial justice campaigns is far more difficult to employ in efforts to reform the criminal justice system.
From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander
Since its excellence needs no explaining, here are a few others that are as worthy of our appreciation, including a heartwarming duet that epitomizes Parton’s universal appeal.
From Salon ● Aug. 29, 2026
With Craftsman bungalows and tree-lined streets, the city still epitomizes suburban U.S.A. — but now has a hip new twist.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 24, 2026
The fund, founded in 1929, epitomizes Vanguard Group founder Jack Bogle’s values —own a balanced mix of stocks and bonds, and keep your costs down.
From Barron's ● Apr. 3, 2026
“The Helicoide epitomizes the bid for a really rapid urban modernization,” said Lisa Blackmore, co-editor of a book on the Helicoide titled “Downward Spiral: El Helicoide’s Descent from Mall to Prison.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 9, 2026
The attitude of the lady with the earrings epitomizes the complete indifference of a hotel-keeper to the private lives of its guests nowadays.
From Somehow Good by William Frend De Morgan
That heritage gave both him and the backcountry settlers he epitomized their combative sense of equality and dignity—rooted in the history of British impositions on their ancestral lands in Ulster.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 1, 2026
On what many onlookers credited with being the loudest night of the season, a kindergartner perhaps epitomized what many of this city’s oldest and most die-hard fans are finally feeling.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 18, 2026
Chinese immigrant Polly Bemis epitomized the pioneer-woman ideal.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 3, 2026
Some longevity influencers attract rubbernecking for their quixotic quests to live forever, epitomized by venture capitalist Bryan Johnson’s vampiric infusions of his teenage son’s blood plasma.
From Slate ● Feb. 26, 2026
Altogether there were four brothers—he, Henry, Walter, and Garland—and they epitomized old-time cool: suave, handsome black men who worked hard, drank hard, dressed well, liked fine women and new money.
From "The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother" by James McBride
Times restaurant critic Bill Addison as “deftly engineered chaos,” ultimately epitomizing the “L.A. dreamer, the go-getter.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 9, 2026
A deal epitomizing the new era of resource nationalism was unveiled Wednesday when Glencore agreed to sell a stake in two African copper mines to a consortium backed by the U.S. government.
From MarketWatch ● Feb. 4, 2026
Instead, one play into the second half showed they didn’t while also epitomizing all that went wrong on a day when the Seahawks ended up losing 37-3, tying the second-worst loss of the Carroll era.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 5, 2023
A recently discovered bird with a T. rex-like skull was unearthed in China — epitomizing, in one bizarre fossil, a visual representation of the long, strange evolution from dinosaurs to birds.
From Salon ● Jan. 6, 2023
Having no illusions, and being a severely practical man, Vanderbilt well knew the pretensions of this trading class; with many a cynical remark, aptly epitomizing the point, he often made sport of their assumptions.
From Great Fortunes from Railroads by Gustavus Myers
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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.
