boyfriend
Americanadjective
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of boyfriend
Explanation
A boyfriend is a male romantic partner. Your cousin might ask if she can bring her boyfriend to the family Thanksgiving dinner this year. Usually, your boyfriend is a boy or man you're romantically involved with. Your aunt might join a dating site after breaking up with her boyfriend, and your ten year old neighbor might announce she has a boyfriend after a boy leaves a candy bar on her desk. The words boyfriend and girlfriend first appeared in the early 1900s, around the start of modern dating in the US.
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:
As a young professional, my trick ankle gave out and I collapsed in front of my boyfriend, Drew, in the parking lot of a TV studio in Hollywood.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 23, 2026
Reams of magazine profiles spotlight everyday people choosing to share their lives with an AI boyfriend, girlfriend or spouse.
From Salon ● Oct. 23, 2026
She would like to set up home with her boyfriend, who lives in the eastern city of Valencia, but the couple says apartment prices are out of their reach.
From Barron's ● Oct. 15, 2026
She and her boyfriend, Cheng Ming, plan to study AI in hopes of finding tech jobs.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 13, 2026
She must have imagined her boyfriend would come running just as the train was about to leave, and they would jump aboard and go somewhere.
From "Everything Sad Is Untrue" by Daniel Nayeri
“I’ve made lots of mistakes with boyfriends and husbands,” said Johnson, who has been married three times.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 27, 2026
It’s women bringing their boyfriends, women who now bring their husbands, couples coming together, and I love it.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 1, 2026
The phenomenon of artificial intelligence boyfriends and girlfriends is growing worldwide, along with the prevalence of human-like avatars that sell products or stand in for loved ones who have died.
From Barron's ● Jul. 15, 2026
Convent boarding houses are affordable and clean, but there are rules: curfews, chores and sometimes nuns who vet boyfriends.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 11, 2026
His mother had a hot temper, and boyfriends and husbands came and went as they moved from one small California town to another.
From "Boots on the Ground: America's War in Vietnam" by Elizabeth Partridge
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
