bravo
Americaninterjection
noun
-
a shout of “bravo!”
-
a daring bandit, assassin, or murderer, especially one hired to steal or murder for another.
-
a word used in communications to represent the letter B.
verb (used without object)
interjection
noun
-
a cry of "bravo"
-
a hired killer or assassin
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of bravo
First recorded in 1755–65; from Italian; see brave
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:
"No, I stopped," said Meloni, prompting EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen to cheer "bravo".
From Barron's ● Jun. 17, 2026
When Maxey—and really, bravo for Maxey, who is the soul of this Philly team—put Game 7 with a string of fearless drives, the statement was Lazarus-like.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 4, 2026
So bravo to you for taking this on.
From MarketWatch ● Mar. 19, 2026
"You have brought happiness to all Ivorians, bravo, bravo," said President Alassane Ouattara of Ivory Coast, which hosted the pan-African tournament.
From BBC ● Feb. 13, 2024
Any bravo who saw the prospect of some caprice-suiting as inviting enough to visit the Amazons himself, Carvajal solemnly warned, “would go a boy and return an old man.”
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
![]()
Sandoval, known for the Scandoval cheating scandal that erupted on the hit Bravo series “Vanderpump Rules” in 2023, filed a temporary restraining order against Robinson and her father J. Will Robinson on June 25.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 7, 2026
Bravo remains a life boat on the sinking ship that is the cable network business and is a key content provider to Peacock.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 30, 2026
But the film proceeds at its own steady pace as measured by Ms. Bravo, with a psycho-cinematic complexity that transcends any routine mystery movie.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 9, 2026
Private equity firm Thoma Bravo bought the company in 2014 and took it public in 2017, only to buy it back in 2022 for $6.9 billion.
From Barron's ● Jun. 9, 2026
Sergeant Walcott from Bravo Company was sergeant of the guard, and he gave us a pep talk.
From "Fallen Angels" by Walter Dean Myers
![]()
Long before this, however, the alarm had been given to other personages of our story; the bravoes in one place; and Agnes and Perpetua in another.
From The Betrothed From the Italian of Alessandro Manzoni by Manzoni, Alessandro
With the garrison of bravoes which he kept at the castle he could defy an army, which he would have crushed in the valley beneath, before an individual could reach the summit.
From The Betrothed From the Italian of Alessandro Manzoni by Manzoni, Alessandro
But no one could account for the attack of the bravoes: all agreed in suspecting Don Roderick; but the rest was total obscurity.
From The Betrothed From the Italian of Alessandro Manzoni by Manzoni, Alessandro
As he approached the castle he made a sign to all the bravoes he met to follow him: filled with unusual apprehension, but with their accustomed submission, they obeyed; their number increased every moment.
From The Betrothed From the Italian of Alessandro Manzoni by Manzoni, Alessandro
However, if there were no bravoes, there was decidedly no hissing.
From Paris and the Parisians in 1835 (Vol. 1 of 2) by Trollope, Frances Milton
“She was nervous at first . . . but she stopped the show several times, and the bravos rang out like pistol shots when she finished.”
From Washington Post ● Dec. 10, 2015
Rachel Moore is drawing bravos in Los Angeles, where she's headed to lead its downtown Music Center after 11 years as executive director of New York City-based American Ballet Theatre.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 18, 2015
And these—he pointed to some huge black bulls—were Percy’s toros bravos.
From The New Yorker ● Apr. 13, 2015
I can only assume the the few bravos were ironic.
From The Guardian ● Aug. 3, 2012
Next thing, I heave myself up and am on top, thumped all round with bravos by other riders.
From "Beast Rider" by Tony Johnston & María Elena Fontanot de Rhoads
![]()
Onetime Hero Coste, bravoed in Manhattan as a counterspy in 1945, was now arrested in France as a wartime spy for Germany and a collaborator since 1940.
From Time Magazine Archive
![]()
At the end of the piece, the audience bravoed noisily.
From Time Magazine Archive
![]()
He was bravoed in the capitals of Europe and South America, where he made the bolero famous.
From Time Magazine Archive
![]()
After the festival's opening concert last week, a capacity audience of 2,200 stamped, clapped and bravoed in a demonstration that verged on Beatlemania.
From Time Magazine Archive
![]()
"And my Sunbeam was bravoed, and encored, and crowned with flowers, was she not?"
From The Baronet's Bride by Fleming, May Agnes
Nearby, on an old-fashioned bed topped by a canopy, sat bravoing Authoress de Beauvoir.
From Time Magazine Archive
![]()
But, once there, the power and diamond-hard brilliance of his playing had the studio audience bravoing between movements, despite NBC's standing request to the audience not to applaud until the work is finished.
From Time Magazine Archive
![]()
He was visibly furious when the soloists in Otello tricked him by going offstage by another exit and hiding until Toscanini was forced to face the bravoing audience alone.
From Time Magazine Archive
![]()
There was a burst of loud bravoing and clapping.
From Mortal Coils by Huxley, Aldous
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.