- present participle of interest.
interesting
Americanadjective
-
engaging or exciting and holding the attention or curiosity.
an interesting book.
- Synonyms:
- entertaining, absorbing
- Antonyms:
- dull
-
arousing a feeling of interest.
an interesting face.
idioms
adjective
Usage
What are other ways to say interesting? A person or a thing that is interesting arouses a feeling of curiosity or concern, or is engaging and exciting. But interesting isn’t quite the same as pleasing or gratifying. Find out why on Thesaurus.com.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of interesting
Explanation
When you're giving a speech, you probably hope that your audience is gazing at you in fascination because what you're saying is so interesting, and not because you've got something weird on your face. The adjective interesting describes something that makes you curious, or catches your attention, but sometimes people use the word in a doubtful way when they are taken aback but want to be polite. Like if your grandmother looks at your new tattoo and says, "Well, that's certainly interesting!" Chances are she's not actually feeling very enthusiastic about your choice of body art.
Vocabulary lists containing interesting
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.
Jaehyun: What I found out that was interesting recently is now, if you hear a song, people say, “Oh, this sounds like an NCT 127 song.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 25, 2026
“You find your people and pursue the things that are interesting to you,” Zimmerman said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 25, 2026
But Paul Irving, the 74-year-old former chairman of the Milken Institute Center for the Future of Aging, calls the 70s “a really interesting interstitial period that we haven’t talked about enough.”
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 23, 2026
"In terms of Croydon Council providing policy documents, the interesting thing is that the majority of these documents are already publicly available online," he said.
From BBC ● Aug. 16, 2026
He had also gotten a clunk on the head, but he didn't even care about that because it was so interesting, what pushing would do.
From "All About Sam" by Lois Lowry
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.
