exaggeration

noun

ex·​ag·​ger·​a·​tion ig-ˌza-jə-ˈrā-shən 

plural exaggerations

: an act or instance of exaggerating something : overstatement of the truth

She told us what happened without exaggeration.

: a statement that exaggerates something

a report filled with exaggerations and outright lies

But it's no exaggeration to say that this car has been one of the major linchpins of the burgeoning Asian hot-rod phenomenon.

—Tony Swan

Scads of fibs, exaggerations and misleading statements have been swept up in the dragnet …

—James Poniewozik

Synonyms

• caricature
• coloring
• elaboration
• embellishment
• embroidering
• embroidery
• hyperbole
• magnification
• overstatement
• padding
• stretching

Examples of exaggeration in a Sentence

their exaggeration was such that a rainstorm became a hurricane

Recent Examples on the Web

That is almost surely an exaggeration; a 2007 Cheese Market News editorial, for instance, mentions Gouda as only the third-most-popular cheese in the world, after cheddar and mozzarella. —Ars Technica, 5 Feb. 2025

Reliable reporting from Sudan is difficult given communication challenges and exaggerations by both the RSF and the Sudanese military. —Jon Gambrell, Los Angeles Times, 26 Jan. 2025

For example, the current model of airspace allocation, based on decades-old frameworks, contrasts sharply with the potential for drone corridors that could populate the skies with the density of a neutron star (OK, slight exaggeration). —Clyde Wayne Crews Jr., Forbes, 12 Jan. 2025

Here was elegance without exaggeration, tension and beauty without stagy excess. —James Shapiro, The New York Review of Books, 3 Jan. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1565, in the meaning defined above