visionary
Americanadjective
-
given to or characterized by fanciful, not presently workable, or unpractical ideas, views, or schemes.
a visionary enthusiast.
- Synonyms:
- impracticable, impractical
- Antonyms:
- practical
-
given to or concerned with seeing visions.
-
belonging to or seen in a vision.
-
unreal; imaginary.
visionary evils.
- Synonyms:
- chimerical, illusory, fancied
-
purely idealistic or speculative; impractical; unrealizable.
a visionary scheme.
- Synonyms:
- unrealistic
-
of, relating to, or proper to a vision.
noun
-
visionaries
plural
-
a person of unusually keen foresight.
-
a person who sees visions.
-
a person who is given to audacious, highly speculative, or impractical ideas or schemes; dreamer.
adjective
-
marked by vision or foresight
a visionary leader
-
incapable of being realized or effected; unrealistic
-
(of people) characterized by idealistic or radical ideas, esp impractical ones
-
given to having visions
-
of, of the nature of, or seen in visions
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of visionary
Explanation
You've got big ideas. Crazy ideas. But forward-thinking ideas — ideas that just might change the way the world works. You're considered a visionary. Visionaries are ahead of their time, always thinking creatively. You could say that a visionary can envision what the future holds and come up with solutions that fit that picture. Those wild ideas aren't always met with appreciation though. Skeptics think that visionaries aren't grounded in reality. And usually the visionaries tell them to stop being so shortsighted!
Vocabulary lists containing visionary
Common Senses: Vid, Vis ("See")
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"A Modest Proposal" by Jonathan Swift
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30 GRE Words Beginning with "T" "U" "V" and "W"
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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:
At 22, the Chilean singer-songwriter, most identifiable by her fire engine red tresses, is one of the most visionary newcomers in the latest wave of post-urbano Latin artists.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 29, 2026
It is likely that had Mr. Bezos never lived, another visionary would have created an online “everything store” once the internet arrived.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 16, 2026
A bold thinker or visionary is not necessarily a great leader.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 4, 2026
Leopold Aschenbrenner was hailed as a visionary in artificial intelligence.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 29, 2026
Thus, like the work of so many visionary artists before her, Cassiopeia’s painting was met only with awkward silence and puzzled looks, until someone’s imagination took the necessary leap.
From "The Interrupted Tale" by Maryrose Wood
They are something I have never seen before, visionaries at the joyous beginning of something new, something huge, who are utterly fatalistic.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 1, 2026
L.A. has reciprocated by sending our visionaries to Salzburg, where director Peter Sellars and conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, for instance, have been given the license and means to inspire a reinvention of musical and theatrical thinking.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 5, 2026
“We have the benefit of being founded and led by Elon Musk, one of the great visionaries of our generation,” SpaceX touted in its IPO paperwork.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 5, 2026
What creative visionaries achieve with Legos is very different from Explosive Media’s slopaganda cartoons, to be clear.
From Salon ● Apr. 26, 2026
The first scythes were true visionaries and saw the wisdom of continuing to cultivate wisdom.
From "Scythe" by Neal Shusterman
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.
