blockbuster
Americannoun
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an aerial bomb containing high explosives and weighing from four to eight tons, used as a large-scale demolition bomb.
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a motion picture, novel, etc., especially one lavishly produced, that has or is expected to have wide popular appeal or financial success.
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something or someone that is forcefully or overwhelmingly impressive, effective, or influential.
The campaign was a blockbuster.
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a real-estate speculator who practices blockbusting.
noun
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a large bomb used to demolish extensive areas or strengthened targets
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a very successful, effective, or forceful person, thing, etc
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a lavish film, show, novel, etc, that proves to be an outstanding popular success
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of blockbuster
Explanation
A blockbuster is a Hollywood movie that's made with a large budget and big stars. A true blockbuster is extremely popular and brings in a lot of money. Typically, a blockbuster is a fabulous summer movie that audiences line up to see the first weekend it's released. You can also call a successful play or a new, popular video game a blockbuster. Less, often, a huge bomb is a blockbuster — this is the word's original, 1940s meaning, from the fact that such a bomb could destroy an entire city block. The entertainment meaning, from the 1950s, began as theater slang.
Vocabulary lists containing blockbuster
And the Oscar Goes to... Award-worthy Words
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Academy Awards, List 4
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This Week in Words: Current Event Vocabulary for November 4–November 10, 2023
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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.
That came on the back of another blockbuster day for Elon Musk's SpaceX, which jumped almost 20 percent for the second day in a row after listing Monday.
From Barron's • Jun. 16, 2026
Spielberg’s “Disclosure Day,” which finds him revisiting the alien genre of blockbuster that his earlier classics all but defined, centers on two characters brought together by cosmic forces beyond their understanding.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 16, 2026
Wednesday’s readout on lower inflation, followed by Friday’s blockbuster stock debut by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, had left investors feeling good about stocks heading into the weekend.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 15, 2026
SpaceX’s blockbuster stock-market debut on Friday showed that investors still have an appetite for moonshots.
From MarketWatch • Jun. 14, 2026
Imagine a blockbuster movie about a world united in battle against Nazi oppression.
From "A Thousand Sisters" by Elizabeth Wein
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.
