audacity

American  

[aw-das-i-tee] / ɔˈdæs ɪ ti /

noun

• audacities
  plural

1. boldness or daring, especially with confident or arrogant disregard for personal safety, conventional thought, or other restrictions.

   Synonyms:

   foolhardiness, temerity, grit, spunk, nerve

   Antonyms:

   prudence, discretion

2. effrontery or insolence; shameless boldness.

   His questioner's audacity shocked the lecturer.

   Synonyms:

   brashness, impertinence, impudence

   Antonyms:

   discretion, prudence

3. Usually audacities audacious or particularly bold or daring acts or statements.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• audacities
  plural

Etymology

Origin of audacity

First recorded in 1400–50; late Middle English audacite, equivalent to Latin audāc- (stem of audāx “bold, daring”) + -ity

Explanation

If you have audacity then you're one daring — and perhaps reckless — character. Running a red light with three previous tickets under your belt certainly shows audacity. And stupidity. The noun audacity developed from the Latin word audacitas, which means “boldness." So someone who shows audacity makes bold moves — and isn't afraid of the consequences. Audacity can be admired or frowned upon, depending how far it's taken and how it rears its head. But as former British Prime Minister and novelist Benjamin Disraeli once said, “Success is the child of audacity.”

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

audacity audacities

This was shockingly unbookish behavior made worse by flabbergasting audacity.

From Salon ● Jul. 7, 2026

Watching that Rosetta Stone-cold stupid footage here, you’re struck not only by his audacity, but by the scene’s excruciating comic pacing.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 26, 2026

“Big Bang” puts readers in the midst of this monumental scientific debate, while demonstrating that, for all its audacity, “the Big Bang model can be understood by everyone.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 19, 2026

"Some people have had the audacity to ask if it was a cross!" he later told BBC Radio 5 live.

From BBC ● May 15, 2026

“I love you too,” I said so low even I couldn’t hear it, but my heart still thumped wildly at the audacity of it.

From "October Sky" by Homer Hickam

Watching “The Goldfinch,” I found myself fantasizing about one of the possible audacities that the movie, absent Theo’s unifying voice, could have hazarded.

From The New Yorker ● Sep. 18, 2019

Besides a light show with a simulated jungle made by hundreds of floor-to-ceiling twisty elastic bands, their presentation didn’t rely on expensive mechanical audacities; it resorted to what the program described as an “analogue inventiveness.”

From Washington Post ● Aug. 5, 2016

While watching “Diary of a Teenage Girl,” I tried to imagine the superb movie that it nearly is, the one that Minnie’s passionate audacities could have sparked.

From The New Yorker ● Aug. 7, 2015

An astounded Paris critic summed up his achievement: "Charles Ives seems to have created, before the Sacre du Printemps, a style which by its audacities places its author among the pioneers of music."

From Time Magazine Archive

They were walking along once more, without any new attempted audacities on Michael's part.

From The Enemies of Women (Los enemigos de la mujer) by Vicente Blasco Ib??ez

Related Words

• chutzpah
• gall
• guts
• spunk