pizzazz
Britishnoun
Etymology
Origin of pizzazz
C20: origin obscure
Explanation
People with pizzazz are glamorous and fun to be with; they have that certain something that attracts others to them. Inanimate objects can also have pizzazz, like a school gymnasium that's been decorated for a dance or a website that's redesigned to be more flashy and exciting. Pizzazz began in the 1930s as a slang term, and it's still considered an informal way of describing excitement or zest.
Vocabulary lists containing pizzazz
Leeva at Last
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Keep Dancing, Lizzie Chu
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Those Kids from Fawn Creek
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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.
He paid a high price for his lack of pizzazz when he ran for president in 2002.
From Barron's • Mar. 23, 2026
That would be the Hard Rock Casino Tejon, whose opening on Thursday brings industrial-strength Indian gaming — and some Hollywood pizzazz — to a territory better known for cowboy hats, farmland and petroleum extraction.
From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 13, 2025
The early scenes have a certain ponderous solemnity as two hunter-warrior-predator brothers from the Yautja race fight for honor with weapons that combine the clank of all things medieval with modern pizzazz.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 6, 2025
Costume designer Paula Bradley drapes Kardashian and her co-stars in a range of expensive fabrics, occasionally burying them in a dead animal or Muppet skin to add pizzazz.
From Salon • Nov. 6, 2025
Hana and Hadia get an idea to change the carefully organized composition of the loot bags, to add some pizzazz to the whole thing.
From "Saints and Misfits" by S.K. Ali
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.
