aperçu
Americannoun
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aperçus
plural
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a hasty glance; a glimpse.
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an immediate estimate or judgment; perception; insight.
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an outline or summary.
noun
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an outline; summary
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an insight
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of aperçu
First recorded in 1825–30; from French: literally, “perceived”; past participle of the verb apercevoir
Explanation
An apercu is a brief, clever review or summation of something. If your synopsis of last week's episode of your favorite TV show is funny and sharp, you can call it an apercu. Sometimes an apercu is simply a witty comment or a clever anecdote: "He is so fun at parties because he always comes up with such brilliant apercus." The word is often spelled with a cedilla, a French accent that softens the C so that it's pronounced like an S: aperçu. The word is from the French apercevoir, "to perceive."
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:
I guess we could fault Caleb for this aperçu, but in a novel that purports to be about the slippery idea of authorship, let’s blame Lipstein.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 18, 2022
“It’s an aperçu of Alex Trebek, human being. What is he like? What has he done? How did he screw up? Things like that.”
From Slate ● Jul. 22, 2020
It includes the source of Judd’s aperçu, a 1974 Art in America article titled “Malevich: Independent Form, Color, Surface,” as well as essays by Yve-Alain Bois and other scholars.
From New York Times ● Mar. 11, 2011
Once the full force of his Sistine Chapel aperçu is realised, it becomes impossible – at least for me – to regard the visual arts in the same way.
From The Guardian ● Aug. 27, 2010
The word aperçu my father used to object to.
From The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, Volume 1 by Augustus J. C. Hare
Herzen’s character sketches and aperçus amount to an intellectual and political history of Russia and Western Europe in the first two-thirds of the 19th century.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 4, 2026
Reproduced in Pinckney’s new memoir, “Come Back in September: A Literary Education on West Sixty-Seventh Street, Manhattan,” those aperçus, which belong in some kind of literary hall of fame, include:
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 21, 2022
But Jared’s unforced drollery and naive aperçus resemble nothing so much as late-period Vonnegut.
From Washington Post ● Sep. 1, 2020
Poniewozik contrives many memorable aperçus to indicate Trump’s shape-shifting over the decades, in response to his environment.
From The New Yorker ● Oct. 4, 2019
These aperçus left over from the great speculations are the golden threads which successive thinkers weave into the pattern of their thought.
From A Preface to Politics by Walter Lippmann
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
