an extraordinary success.
His act is a real wow.
excitement, interest, great pleasure, or the like.
a car that will add some wow to your life.
Audio. a slow wavering of pitch in sound recording or reproducing equipment caused by uneven speed of the turntable or the tape.
Scot. and North England Dialect. a howl, wail, bark, whine, or mew.
1890–95; perhaps identical with Scots wow! exclamation of surprise or admiration
1800–10 wow 2 for defs. 2, 3; 1930–35 wow 2 for def. 1; imitative; the audio term is probably an independent formation
When you wow your teacher, you get him really excited about your three paragraph essay. To wow is to impress. If you imagine saying, "Wow!" after tasting your friend's coconut cupcakes, you'll understand exactly what the verb wow means. When the cupcakes make you exclaim like that, they wow you. A wonderful movie will wow you, and your dad's juggling act might also wow you. The word wow is Scottish in origin, an amazed interjection from the 1500's. The verb form came along in American slang much later, in the 1920's.
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“When ‘CBS Mornings’ co-host Nate Burleson puts on a massager and he’s like, ‘Ooh, wow, this feels like real human hands,’ — none of that is scripted,” said Meehan.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 19, 2026
Those casts had their moments, but wow, even at 15, we knew this first season back was awful and not funny.
From Salon ● Jul. 5, 2026
They contributed to a new standard of elaborate, hours-long concerts with more emphasis on choreography, pyrotechnics, costume changes and technology to wow audiences.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 27, 2026
Chinese firms Unitree and AgiBot aim to again wow spectators with their dextrous humanoid robots, while European start-ups including Genesis and PAL Robotics will also be on show.
From Barron's ● Jun. 17, 2026
“Doesn’t matter—but, wow, a Mongol gunner? Like the ones they use against cavalry? Against Rostam, my steed? Wait. Doesn’t matter. Also, by the way, we’ve been asked to leave.”
From "The Many Assassinations of Samir, the Seller of Dreams" by Daniel Nayeri
The business pushed to become a sports-viewing destination by adding in 40-foot screens called WOW Walls, which can be split into subscreens tuned to different channels.
From Slate ● Jun. 25, 2026
“Our commitment has always been to invest in Inglewood, and that commitment goes far beyond our network,” Krantz wrote, adding that WOW wants Inglewood to remain a strong and financially stable “City of Champions.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 9, 2026
On one side: WOW Media, which has a financial partnership with the city of Inglewood that could be worth tens of millions of dollars as an aggressive expansion of its billboard network comes online.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 9, 2026
Outside these campaigns, WOW already operates large digital billboards across the city, including its “Spectaculars” and twisting digital kiosks along major corridors.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 9, 2026
WOW, that came out way wacker than I intended.
From "Odd One Out" by Nic Stone
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.
