world-building

American  

[wurld-bil-ding] / ˈwɜrldˌbɪl dɪŋ /

world building or worldbuilding

noun

1. the process of developing a detailed and plausible fictional world for a novel or story, especially in science fiction, fantasy, and video games.

   Drawing a convincing map with boundaries and landscape features is a natural starting point for world-building.

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Other Word Forms

• world-build
  verb (used without object)

Etymology

Origin of world-building

First recorded in 1820–25, referring to or contrasted with the Biblical creation of the world

Example Sentences

Animator John Whitney used an early computer to produce images for Alfred Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” in 1958, but the breakthrough into cinematic world-building came in the 1990s with “Terminator 2” and “Toy Story.”

From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 14, 2026

The most impressive part of French animated sci-fi epic “Arco,” which took the top prize at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival, is its imaginative world-building.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 22, 2025

Le Guin’s world-building and audacious ideas make many other novels feel two-dimensional.

From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 12, 2025

When movies are treated as malleable, disposable world-building over actual filmmaking, it’s no wonder that the stars of MCU movies don’t seem to care about the films they’re in at all.

From Salon • Jul. 25, 2025

They’d spent a small fortune on in-app purchases: skins and maps in Minecraft, V-Bucks in Fortnite, unlimited lives and gems in a new multiplayer world-building game.

From "Millionaires for the Month" by Stacey McAnulty