swank
1 Americannoun
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dashing smartness, as in dress or appearance; style.
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a swagger.
adjective
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stylish or elegant.
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pretentiously stylish.
verb (used without object)
verb
verb
noun
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Also called: swankpot. a swaggering or conceited person
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elegance or style, esp of a showy kind
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swagger; ostentation
adjective
Etymology
Origin of swank
1800–10; compare Scots swank lively, perhaps ultimately representing back formation from Old English swancor lithe; akin to Middle Dutch swanc supple, Middle High German swanken to sway
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:
The 1880s Artillery Officer Quarters, for example, have been restored and brilliantly whitewashed as the swank Capella Hotel.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 27, 2025
EVANSTON, Ill.— Bryan and Kay Keenan just paid $2 million for a 1,600-square-foot apartment in The Mather, a swank retirement community here.
From Barron's ● Oct. 26, 2025
Matt Kinley’s shapeshifting scenic design, combined with Warren Letton’s hypnotic lighting and Jill Parker’s swank costumes, allow scenes to emerge like an impresario’s dreamscapes.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 14, 2025
“My comfort zone is being outside of my comfort zone,” León said from his shopping-bag-strewn suite at a swank Beverly Hills hotel in California, his girlfriend and team at his side.
From New York Times ● May 27, 2024
There's nothing swank about it, but there's a line out the door even though it's only seven.
From "Will Grayson, Will Grayson" by John Green and David Levithan
To stop one owner from taking three buildings nonunion, 15 janitors and organizers staged a mock funeral, carrying a coffin symbolizing "the death of justice" past the owner's home in one of Washington's swanker neighborhoods.
From Time Magazine Archive
A stacking armchair designed in 1929, its rear legs, back rail and arms a single piece of bent wood, is swanker, a kind of streamlined Thonet.
From Time Magazine Archive
Under President Peirce, Kenyon has drawn its 250 students largely from prosperous Episcopalian families, supported flourishing chapters of the swanker Greek letter fraternities rarely found on Midwestern campuses.
From Time Magazine Archive
"And I never shake hands with a swanker, do I, Bonser?"
From The Sailor by Snaith, J. C.
He spends his money quickly, alas! that poor young swanker.'
From The Man Upstairs and Other Stories by Wodehouse, P. G. (Pelham Grenville)
Brodard Chateau is probably the swankest restaurant in Little Saigon, a converted Victorian mansion marooned on a freeway frontage road.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 31, 2017
The swankest New Year’s Eve in the city harks back to the 1950s with a gala black-tie dinner created by chef Jacques Sorci at the Carlyle Restaurant.
From BusinessWeek ● Dec. 27, 2011
According to the Wall Street Journal, "PC is one of six teenagers on the show, who flaunt their family riches as the cameras follow them around NYC’s swankest restaurants and boutiques."
From Salon ● Jul. 19, 2011
He entertained lavishly, kept tables permanently reserved at the West End's swankest nightclubs.
From Time Magazine Archive
The third confidant was an older man of sad mien who would have passed easily in the swankest of Washington, New York or London private clubs.
From The Common Man by Schelling, George Luther
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.
