ugly duckling

American  

noun

ugly ducklings plural

1. an unattractive or unpromising child who becomes a beautiful or much-admired adult.

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ugly duckling British  

noun

1. a person or thing, initially ugly or unpromising, that changes into something beautiful or admirable

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ugly duckling Idioms  

1. A homely or unpromising individual who grows into an attractive or talented person, as in She was the family ugly duckling but blossomed in her twenties. This term alludes to Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale about a cygnet hatched with ducklings that is despised for its clumsiness until it grows up into a beautiful swan. The tale was first translated into English in 1846, and the term was used figuratively by 1871.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• ugly ducklings
  plural

Etymology

Origin of ugly duckling

First recorded in 1880–85; after the bird in the story of the same name by Hans Christian Andersen

Example Sentences

Edith saw herself as the ugly duckling but excelled in ballet.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 14, 2026

In fact, Callas made herself out of what she considered to be an ugly duckling.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 14, 2024

"It is an incredibly difficult thing to go from turning that person from an ugly duckling into a swan."

From BBC • Jul. 18, 2024

The bewitchingly fragrant fruit — a relative of apples and pears — does go through an ugly duckling phase, Walden acknowledges.

From Seattle Times • Oct. 31, 2023

It was like the makeover scenes in my American movies, where they take the dorky guy or girl, fix the hair and change the clothes, and the ugly duckling becomes the swan.

From "Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood" by Trevor Noah