bloviate
Americanverb (used without object)
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of bloviate
1850–55, pseudo-Latin alteration of blow 2 to boast; popularized by Warren G. Harding
Explanation
To bloviate is to talk, but not just to chat. To bloviate means to go on and on and on and on, usually in a pompous way. Can you hear the blow in the word bloviate? That's a clue that someone bloviating is blowing some serious hot air. When someone bloviates, he is speaking in an empty, pretentious, full-of-himself manner. This word is often associated with politicians, who probably invented bloviating. When someone is talking a lot and saying a little, they're bloviating.
Vocabulary lists containing bloviate
Word Warriors: Four Years of Words Worth Reviving
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Words Coined or Popularized by Presidents
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Ben Zimmer's 30 Great American Words
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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:
"Don't expect the AG to let him just bloviate as they did in their case," he wrote.
From Salon ● Nov. 29, 2023
Yes, he’s paid to bloviate on college football issues.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 5, 2023
Actors jockey, directors bloviate, writers fume at liberties taken.
From New York Times ● Apr. 20, 2023
They are glib, charming, insulting, cranky, funny, learned, loud, insightful — we’re talking TV hosts here, who chat, judge, entertain, bloviate and moderate their way through popular day and nighttime shows with ease.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 7, 2017
Example: It’s tough to watch them bloviate about sweeping change when our internal processes are still such a mess.
From Time ● Jul. 27, 2015
While Trump bloviated about tariffs, the Hispanic Republican Club chair nibbled on dessert.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 25, 2026
Last weekend, Cruz tweeted that he proudly wore Boehner’s "drunken, bloviated scorn."
From Fox News ● Apr. 14, 2021
What, besides the bloviated tweets that will accompany even the most modest ratings victory?
From Salon ● Jan. 1, 2017
“The majority of men do it, and all would be mortified if others heard their bloviated stories.”
From Washington Times ● Oct. 9, 2016
The notion of a younger generation calling out hypocrisy by actually taking the actions an older generation only bloviated about holds some appeal, but the play is more interested in validating several wearying middle-age fantasies.
From New York Times ● Feb. 2, 2016
Phenomenal amounts of self-righteous bloviating about enlightened or benighted child-feeding have gone on for centuries.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026
Some might find it humanizing—proof that below the bloviating gestalt, the president can become awed by existential futility.
From Slate ● Jun. 11, 2026
And it’s easy, as many quickly did, to write off this push to spruce up and fill up America’s most notorious prison-turned-national park as just bloviating or distraction.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 5, 2025
The "Call Her Daddy" conversation was not the contentious tête-à-tête the chattering class has come to expect after decades of cable news bloviating somehow came to represent meaningful political coverage.
From Salon ● Oct. 8, 2024
His passion when bloviating was furious and terrible to look upon; but there was nothing to it more than sound and pretense.
From The Vigilance Committee of 1856 by James O'Meara
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.
