self-aggrandizing

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of self-aggrandizing While Musk’s often self-aggrandizing moves can be polarizing, Trump’s promotion of him as his proxy balances it out. Barnini Chakraborty, The Washington Examiner, 28 Mar. 2025 Admittedly, to anyone not in Chalamet’s camp at this moment, that speech might have seemed self-aggrandizing, a kind of boy-king entitlement. Stephanie Zacharek, TIME, 25 Feb. 2025 Heavy handed, self-aggrandizing hype and a near certain success in doing what any other major American politician would have been afraid to do. Ted Johnson, Deadline, 9 Feb. 2025 When senators read from their self-aggrandizing scripts, the resemblance to play actors is incontrovertible. Sun Sentinel Editorial Board, Sun Sentinel, 20 Jan. 2025 Corbet recalled shooting the scene where Van Buren leads a group of party guests outside to a hillside overlook that would become the location for his institute and delivers a long speech that is somehow both self-pitying and self-aggrandizing. Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times, 19 Dec. 2024 Classifying what Piece by Piece will be exactly, especially in the often self-aggrandizing realm of the musical biopic, is a challenge. Daniel Dockery, Vulture, 28 Aug. 2024 The rise of Huawei is painstakingly rendered in a small library of self-aggrandizing literature that the company publishes, including several volumes of quotes from its founder. Steven Levy, WIRED, 16 Nov. 2020 Statistically, such worker is more likely to be female than male, as men are not only more likely to engage in self-aggrandizing deception, but also to get away with it. Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, Forbes, 21 Oct. 2024
Recent Examples of Synonyms for self-aggrandizing
Adjective
  • In the 1998 episode, Theroux, 53, appears briefly as an egotistical writer who flirts with Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw at a party.
    John Russell, People.com, 26 Mar. 2025
  • Yes: Crumb’s work is egotistical, misogynist, racist—or, more generously, a feculent parody.
    Dan Piepenbring, Harper's Magazine, 3 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • In a world where deal flow is crucial, being labeled as an arrogant VC results in missing out on prime opportunities.
    David Nour, Forbes.com, 31 Mar. 2025
  • The arrogant anti-union stance did not start with the current CEO; even the legendary Studs Terkel was slapped down by WFMT management for his earlier support of an effort to unionize in 1990.
    Chicago Tribune, Chicago Tribune, 29 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • Daemon, Viserys’s vainglorious younger brother, had married his niece in part as a way to strengthen his own bid for the throne, and Alicent had pushed for the ascension of her immature firstborn, Aegon.
    Inkoo Kang, The New Yorker, 5 Aug. 2024
  • Debuting March 3, the six-part realpolitik satire, created and executive produced by Succession alum Will Tracy, sees Oscar and Emmy winner Winslet return to HBO in an often hilarious role as the vainglorious Elena.
    Dominic Patten, Deadline, 20 June 2024
Adjective
  • The Green Mile, with its three-hours-plus run time, might as well be exhibit A for Hollywood’s myriad overlong, self-important Oscar-bait dramas.
    Tim Grierson, Vulture, 21 Feb. 2025
  • Unsurprisingly, the small army of senior executives with make-work jobs and self-important titles, who add little to nothing to build Hearst’s brands, apparently made it through today relatively unscathed.
    Caitlin Huston, The Hollywood Reporter, 21 Nov. 2024
Adjective
  • Ava Daniels is a young comedy writer who is unable to find work due to an insensitive tweet and her reputation for being self-centered and arrogant.
    Paul Tassi, Forbes.com, 9 Apr. 2025
  • Real celebrities guest-starred in often awkward encounters with the always vain and self-centered Miss Piggy.
    James Mercadante, EW.com, 1 Apr. 2025
Adjective
  • This is the worst kind of football team: a conceited but objectively mediocre squad.
    Dieter Kurtenbach, The Mercury News, 17 Nov. 2024
  • Rory Kinnear steals some of the best lines as the conceited British prime minister, and Ato Essandoh, as Kate’s deputy chief, plays the ever-flustered man surrounded by extremely capable women with admirable humor, charm, and confidence.
    Ben Travers, IndieWire, 30 Oct. 2024
Adjective
  • As Peggy Dodd, consigliere to her bumptious 1950s cult-leader husband, Adams tends to wear a soft smile and blouses buttoned to the neck — a picture-perfect model of mid-century femininity.
    Matthew Jacobs, Vulture, 6 Dec. 2024
  • It’s all spanked along by one of those golly-gee bumptious holiday musical scores.
    Owen Gleiberman, Variety, 27 Nov. 2024
Adjective
  • But my in-laws seemed not to catch this smug look of his, and when my mother-in-law excused herself to go to the bathroom, my father-in-law took the opportunity to go over to his desk and take out one of his special blue envelopes.
    Hazlitt, Hazlitt, 2 Apr. 2025
  • But those smug computers obviously haven’t seen a shirtless Illini coach Brad Underwood and his Super Soaker squirt gun.
    Paul Sullivan, Chicago Tribune, 18 Mar. 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Self-aggrandizing.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/self-aggrandizing. Accessed 15 Apr. 2025.

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