fancier
Americannoun
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a person having a liking for or interest in something; enthusiast.
a fancier of sports cars.
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a person who breeds animals, plants, etc., especially in order to improve the strain.
a horse fancier.
noun
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a person with a special interest in something
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a person who breeds plants or animals, often as a pastime
a bird fancier
Etymology
Origin of fancier
Explanation
Someone crazy about something can be called a fancier. If you join a club to promote the well-being of pheasants, someone might describe you as "a pheasant fancier." That just means you like pheasants a lot. The word fancier can refer to someone who fancies (or really likes) something — such as dogs or wine or chocolate. It can also be used to describe someone who breeds a particular animal, with the intent of improving the breed. Make sure you don’t confuse this word with the adjective fancy, which has a comparative form that is also spelled “fancier.” That fancier would be used in the sense of “more ornamental” or “more extravagant” — as in "My prom dress is fancier than yours."
Vocabulary lists containing fancier
Vocabulary Video Contest (2013) - List 1
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2014 Vocabulary Video Contest (A-L)
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Vocab Video Contest (2016) - List 3
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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.
None of the thousands of couples I’ve worked with over the past 30 years have ever told me they wished they’d bought a fancier car.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 7, 2026
I have a fancier fleece blanket that should work nicely for Dr. Frank-N-Furter’s cape.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 26, 2026
“If some app tries to tell you it has a fancier forecast, you roll your eyes a bit, because it all mostly comes from governments.”
From Slate ● Aug. 21, 2026
In general, the growing popularity of cold brews among young people could be seen as an example of so-called 'premiumisation', where businesses make their products look fancier to justify higher prices.
From BBC ● May 28, 2026
The original word, controller, is more likely to be used in business, and the fancier one, comptroller, in government.
From "Woe Is I" by Patricia T. O'Conner
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
