truism

American  

[troo-iz-uhm] / ˈtru ɪz əm /

noun

1. a self-evident, obvious truth.

   Synonyms:

   platitude, cliché

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truism British  

/ ˈtruːɪzəm /

noun

1. an obvious truth; platitude

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Commonly Confused

Contrary to what some people believe, the word truism is not a more elegant word for truth. While the word truth can occasionally be used to refer to a “truism,” since truisms are often true, the reverse—the use of truism to mean “truth”—is unwise. Truism stands for a certain kind of truth—a cliché, a platitude, something so self-evident that it is hardly worth mentioning. One can use it to accuse another writer or speaker of saying something so obvious or evident and trite that pointing it out is pointless. To say that a statement is a truism when you intend to compliment it as truthful, factual, even provable, will merely serve to confuse those who know that calling something a truism is not praise, but a criticism or insult. Note, however, that truism is used in a technical sense in mathematics or philosophy for restating something that is already known from its terms or premises. Examples of such truisms include: “Men are not women” and “Since the circumference of a circle equals twice the radius multiplied by π (2π r ), it equals the diameter multiplied by π (π d ).”

Other Word Forms

• truistic adjective
• truistical adjective

Etymology

Origin of truism

First recorded in 1700–10; true + -ism

Example Sentences

This, like so much of the popular understanding of 15th- and 16th-century Florence, is one of those truisms so often repeated as to become banal.

From The Wall Street Journal

It is a truism that markets are forward-looking—and on a day when the Federal Reserve will dominate headlines, investors may instead want to pay attention to 2026.

From Barron's

It is a truism that markets are forward-looking—and on a day when the Federal Reserve will dominate headlines, investors may instead want to pay attention to 2026.

From Barron's

It has become a tech-industry truism: Spending too little on chips and other computing infrastructure for artificial intelligence is riskier than spending too much.

From The Wall Street Journal

The mayor seems not to have heard of the truism that if you tax something you get less of it.

From The Wall Street Journal