exaggerate
Americanverb (used with object)
verb (used without object)
verb
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to regard or represent as larger or greater, more important or more successful, etc, than is true
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(tr) to make greater, more noticeable, etc, than usual
his new clothes exaggerated his awkwardness
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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exaggerationnoun
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exaggeratornoun
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overexaggerateverb
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exaggerativeadjective
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nonexaggeratingadjective
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unexaggeratingadjective
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exaggeratinglyadverb
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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exaggeratesimple
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exaggeratessimple
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have exaggeratedperfect
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has exaggeratedperfect
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am exaggeratingprogressive
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are exaggeratingprogressive
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is exaggeratingprogressive
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have been exaggeratingperfect progressive
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has been exaggeratingperfect progressive
Past
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exaggeratedsimple
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had exaggeratedperfect
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was exaggeratingprogressive
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were exaggeratingprogressive
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had been exaggeratingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of exaggerate
First recorded in 1525–35; from Latin exaggerātus “heaped up,” past participle of exaggerāre “to heap up,” from ex- ex- 1 + agger “heap” + -āre, infinitive verb suffix
Explanation
When you exaggerate you stretch the truth. Fishermen tend to exaggerate the size of their fish. And children tend to exaggerate the seriousness of their cuts in order to get cute Band-Aids. We all have a tendency to exaggerate. It makes our stories funnier, or more dramatic. After all, when you exaggerate, you're not really lying — you're just overstating things. The word exaggerate can also suggest that a particular characteristic is overdone or almost larger than life. If you describe someone as having an exaggerated limp, he or she might be walking like a gorilla.
Vocabulary lists containing exaggerate
Tier 2 Words for the SBAC ELA Items
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Jim Burke's Academic Vocabulary List
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List 4
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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:
In climate data, "noise" refers to short-erm temperature changes that can temporarily hide or exaggerate the underlying trend.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 1, 2026
Football quarterbacks sometimes exaggerate hits to sell roughing-the-passer penalties.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 12, 2026
Gas prices can rise or fall very quickly and exaggerate the rate of inflation.
From MarketWatch ● May 11, 2026
Rumanes’ lawsuit describes a “culture of deception” at Live Nation, saying its “basic business model was to misstate and exaggerate financial figures in efforts to solicit and secure business.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 23, 2026
Why had she felt the need to exaggerate the children’s progress just because Lady Constance’s remarks had annoyed her?
From "The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: Book I: The Mysterious Howling" by Maryrose Wood
One factor reinforcing Block’s motivation for shorting credit is his opinion that there is too much passive investing in the market that automatically exaggerates moves when they come.
From MarketWatch ● Apr. 1, 2026
Divided by competing urges to “join in and stand out,” the dandy exaggerates style to the point of satire and social impertinence.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 15, 2026
Tech’s dominance in the S&P 500, with the top 10 stocks comprising 40% of market value, exaggerates the current pullback.
From Barron's ● Nov. 5, 2025
As Close broke into laughter, Leger-Walker added, “I did. Maybe it was a couple of hours later, but I definitely returned her messages. She exaggerates that.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 3, 2025
He exaggerates the difficulty of being a student, but his exaggeration reveals a general predicament.
From "Hunger of Memory" by Richard Rodriguez
In the 2001 trial, Giaka was to be a "key" witness in the prosecution's case but the four judges described some of his evidence as "at best grossly exaggerated and at worst simply untrue".
From BBC ● Jul. 25, 2026
Some of his allegations were already known; others he gave no evidence for or exaggerated beyond recognition.
From Slate ● Jul. 17, 2026
As I reported in 2019, many of those arrangements turned out to be exaggerated or bogus, or predated Trump’s claim.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 13, 2026
Pondering the future of the practice, he writes, “some health claims will prove exaggerated or unfounded—that’s the nature of science.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 6, 2026
Ugwu disliked the sly twist of his lips; he always visited at mealtimes and then said “Oh! Oh!” in exaggerated surprise when Olanna asked him to join them in “touching their hands to their mouths.”
From "Half of a Yellow Sun" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
"They've scored 60% of their goals that way," Klopp said of the Gunners - exaggerating for effect.
From BBC ● Jul. 8, 2026
Some economists question if the pattern is repeating itself, thus exaggerating the improvement in the labor market.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 1, 2026
Ballmer, a former long-time CEO of Microsoft, accused Sanberg of targeting him for his well-known interest in environmental sustainability and exaggerating their relationship to convince others to invest in the fraudulent company.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 23, 2026
EU prosecutors first detailed the scam last May, accusing subsidy beneficiaries of making claims for land that they did not own and exaggerating the number of animals on farms.
From Barron's ● Apr. 3, 2026
She had to be exaggerating, he thought, but there was no flicker of humor in her face.
From "Impossible Creatures" by Katherine Rundell
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.
