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
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
A little Stokowski-like pizzazz that accompanied Rachmaninoff’s recording might not have hurt in the long Second Symphony, but even so, this was, like Chan’s concert, a fulfilling Bowl evening.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 21, 2025
“Why not a cat? An animal with some panache? Some pizzazz? Some dignity?”
From "Crenshaw" by Katherine Applegate
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.
