idealize
Americanverb (used with object)
verb (used without object)
verb
-
to consider or represent (something) as ideal
-
(tr) to portray as ideal; glorify
-
(intr) to form an ideal or ideals
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
idealizesimple
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idealizessimple
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have idealizedperfect
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has idealizedperfect
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am idealizingprogressive
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are idealizingprogressive
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is idealizingprogressive
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have been idealizingperfect progressive
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has been idealizingperfect progressive
Past
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idealizedsimple
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had idealizedperfect
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was idealizingprogressive
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were idealizingprogressive
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had been idealizingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of idealize
Explanation
When you idealize something, you think of it as being much better than it really is. You might idealize your beach vacation, completely forgetting that it rained almost every day. If you idealize your favorite teacher, you imagine that he's even more wonderful than he actually is. Many people tend to idealize marriage, believing that simply being married will make them and their partners blissfully happy all the time. To idealize is to take an ordinary, flawed thing, and turn it into something ideal. In fact, ideal, or "perfect," is at the heart of idealize, with its root of the Latin idealis, or "existing in idea."
Vocabulary lists containing idealize
When Fake is Real: Young People Rebel Against Instagram, Via Instagram
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"A Village After Dark" by Kazuo Ishiguro
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Life As We Knew It
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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:
Historian Quinn Slobodian joins Felix Salmon to discuss the tech billionaires who idealize a world without democracy.
From Slate ● Feb. 4, 2025
With a book by Jessie Nelson adapted from Adrienne Shelly‘s film script, “Waitress” has a humanizing matter-of-factness about tropes that other theatrical stories about women often idealize.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 29, 2023
“What’s important is to not make a myth or idealize anyone, including our founder. If we made a myth out of him, we were wrong,” she said.
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 28, 2023
Letting go of a lost cause has two difficult and complicated steps, oversimplified as follows: Fill up your life meaningfully without this person, and resist the temptation to idealize what isn’t there.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 9, 2022
Not much to idealize when you know your aunt is crying herself to sleep next door and nothing can be done.
From "Where Things Come Back" by John Corey Whaley
She idealizes having a big, happy family, but there are aspects of the world that give her pause, so she struggles with whether it’s morally OK to have children.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 11, 2024
Called "splitting," Behr defined this as "the person devalues and idealizes you or others."
From Salon ● Jan. 26, 2023
Because he was the only straight, cis man I ever dated, she idealizes him.
From Slate ● Jan. 7, 2021
Unlike the critic George Saintsbury, who looked to 18th-century literature for “repose and refreshment,” Damrosch never idealizes or whitewashes.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 17, 2019
Just as he idealizes Caroline, he paints the Loyers as the perfect mother and daughter.
From "Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers" by Deborah Heiligman
The concept is illustrated by the Carnot cycle, an idealized model that defines the maximum theoretical efficiency of a heat engine by carefully regulating the movement of heat between hot and cold regions.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 11, 2026
But “Do the Right Thing” remains with us, its urgency and relevance undiminished, waiting for an America open to listen and live up to its idealized aspirations.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 29, 2026
According to Cottrill, the group pushed for repeated aesthetic changes to make Trump appear slimmer and more idealized than the photographic references he was initially using.
From Salon ● May 17, 2026
Unlike some of his artistic peers, who idealized studios and showcases in New York or Europe, Chambers never wanted to leave Altadena.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 6, 2026
Vincent has not drawn an idealized woman; he has rendered her the way he sees her.
From "Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers" by Deborah Heiligman
This verdict is in keeping with the tenor of the last 50 years of classical scholarship, which has moved past—perhaps too far past—any idealizing visions of Pericles and Athens.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 10, 2026
She maintains a nuanced sense of humanity’s transgressions and innocence, without demonizing or idealizing either side.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2025
“We have a way of idealizing and protecting auteurs and putting them on such a pedestal that they become untouchable,” says Godrèche of French attitudes about cinema.
From Seattle Times ● May 15, 2024
By stigmatizing high art and idealizing popular taste, they claim to be striking a blow for true democracy — and not just pandering, as advertisers, politicians and the media do as a matter of course.
From Salon ● Dec. 25, 2021
Also, Theo thinks, Vincent is too focused on Mauve and is idealizing him, as he is wont to do with people.
From "Vincent and Theo: The Van Gogh Brothers" by Deborah Heiligman
Definitions 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.
