Dictionary.com
Thesaurus.com

showman

American  
[shoh-muhn] / ˈʃoʊ mən /

noun

showmen plural
  1. a person who presents or produces a show, especially of a theatrical nature.

  2. a person who is gifted in doing or presenting things theatrically or dramatically.

    He didn't have much voice but was a great showman.


showman British  
/ ˈʃəʊmən /

noun

  1. a person who presents or produces a theatrical show, etc

  2. a person skilled at presenting anything in an effective manner

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

Inflected Forms

Nouns

Etymology

Origin of showman

First recorded in 1725–35; show + -man

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.

See Examples For:

Danish filmmaker Nicolas Winding Refn is willfully and delightfully unpredictable: part showman, part provocateur.

From Los Angeles Times Jul. 23, 2026

But wearing an England football scarf, Union Jack bucket hat and clutching a Paddington Bear, the showman energised a 75,000-strong, multi-generational crowd.

From BBC Jul. 19, 2026

Like the Pardoner in Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” or famed American showman P.T.

From MarketWatch Jul. 2, 2026

Here enters Apollo Creed, heavyweight champion of the world, a brilliant showman inspired by Muhammad Ali.

From The Wall Street Journal Jun. 11, 2026

Phineas Gage's mother said her son exhibited himself here at P. T. Barnum's American Museum on Broadway in New York City Barnum was the gaudiest showman and greatest hoaxer of his age.

From "Phineas Gage" by John Fleischman

Cody named himself after “Buffalo Bill,” one of the most famous showmen of the American Old West, and used the moniker for the rest of his career.

From Los Angeles Times Jun. 11, 2026

Orson and Lorenzo, consummate showmen, were summoned to prisons, where they inspected the heads of inmates and guessed their crimes; at lunatic asylums they were challenged to identify the patients’ disorders.

From The Wall Street Journal Apr. 29, 2026

"It's the end of an era, for over 100 years we and other showmen and their families have lived and worked in Porthcawl helping to make it a busy seaside destination," the Evans family added.

From BBC Jul. 10, 2025

It’s not that Death Cult’s musicians were bad showmen.

From Los Angeles Times May 19, 2025

This piece of information will doubtless astonish a good many showmen.

From Sawdust & Spangles Stories & Secrets of the Circus by Coup, W. C.

Vocabulary.com logo
by dictionary.com

Join 12,000,000 vocabulary learners

Start learning new words today on VocabTrainer.
You'll remember them forever.

Start training