profusion
Americannoun
-
abundance; abundant quantity.
- Synonyms:
- bounty, copiousness
- Antonyms:
- scarcity
-
a great quantity or amount (often followed byof ).
-
lavish spending; extravagance.
- Synonyms:
- waste, excess, profligacy, prodigality
Related Words
See plenty.
Etymology
Origin of profusion
First recorded in 1535–45; rom Latin profūsiōn- (stem of profūsiō ) “a pouring out, extravagance,” originally, “libation”; profuse, fusion
Explanation
If there's an abundance of something, you can say that there's a profusion of it. Hilarious and bizarre YouTube videos certainly exist in profusion. The noun profusion comes from a Latin word profusionem, meaning "a pouring out." So you can think of profusion as an outpouring of something — an overflow or cornucopia of it. An area known for wine making should have a profusion of grapes growing along the hillsides. And an awesome performance should garner a profusion of compliments and shouts of "encore!"
Vocabulary lists containing profusion
The Great Gatsby
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"The Masque of the Red Death" by Edgar Allan Poe
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Dracula
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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.
No background study is necessary to join the membership of Mr. Berry’s readers, though the profusion of titles might seem overwhelming.
From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 23, 2025
This profusion has made the convenience store business one of the most fast-paced and competitive in the country — one that moves in lockstep with boom-and-bust social media attention spans.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 29, 2025
He certainly is not advocating violent demonstrations but even a profusion of peaceful protests elsewhere would still require an increase in public-order policing.
From BBC • Aug. 19, 2025
There’s also evidence that the profusion of bodies and nightmarish scenes that characterize Mitchell’s later work started to creep in before he went to Vietnam.
From Slate • Jun. 6, 2025
In this case, he reckoned, one could obtain the required profusion of neutrons by bombarding an appropriate target with a high-energy deuteron beam.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
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.
