penchant
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of penchant
1665–75; < French, noun use of present participle of pencher to incline, lean < Vulgar Latin *pendicāre, derivative of Latin pendēre to hang
Explanation
A penchant is a strong preference or tendency. If you have a penchant for pizza, you either eat it daily or wish you did. Penchant borrows from French, in which penchant literally means inclined. It goes back to the Latin pendere, for hanging, which is also the source of pendant. In both French and English, speakers have long used the idea of inclination metaphorically: a hillside can be inclined in one direction or another, and so can a person's thoughts. But in English, penchant is only for desires.
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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.
Both were highly critical of ballooning legal costs under Feldstein Soto, as well as her penchant for hiring outside law firms to fight the city’s battles.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 4, 2026
I discussed those questions with Gibney, and what they taught him about Musk and our penchant for enabling men like him, in a wide-ranging conversation transcribed below.
From Salon ● Oct. 16, 2026
Donald Trump has a penchant for branding and in his speech he gave artificial intelligence a new name: super intelligence.
From BBC ● Sep. 22, 2026
The penchant for punning titles hasn’t diminished, however.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 11, 2026
“I love you guys. Even despite your penchant for inferior pizza.”
From "The Serpent King" by Jeff Zentner
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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.
