English Dictionary

SMUG (smugger, smuggest)

Pronunciation (US): Play  (GB): Play

IPA (US): 

Irregular inflected forms: smugger  Listen to US pronunciation  Listen to GB pronunciation, smuggest  Listen to US pronunciation  Listen to GB pronunciation

 Dictionary entry overview: What does smug mean? 

SMUG (adjective)
  The adjective SMUG has 1 sense:

1. marked by excessive complacency or self-satisfactionplay

  Familiarity information: SMUG used as an adjective is very rare.


 Dictionary entry details 


SMUG (adjective)

 Declension: comparative and superlative 
Comparative: smugger  Listen to US pronunciation  Listen to GB pronunciation
Superlative: smuggest  Listen to US pronunciation  Listen to GB pronunciation


Sense 1

Meaning:

Marked by excessive complacency or self-satisfaction

Synonyms:

self-satisfied; smug

Context example:

a smug glow of self-congratulation

Similar:

content; contented (satisfied or showing satisfaction with things as they are)

Derivation:

smugness (an excessive feeling of self-satisfaction)


 Context examples 


The particular one at which my cabman pulled up had an air of smug and demure respectability in its old-fashioned iron railings, its massive folding-door, and its shining brasswork.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Martin came back and looked at the beady eyes, sneering, truculent, cowardly, and there leaped into his vision, as on a screen, the same eyes when their owner was making a sale in the store below—subservient eyes, smug, and oily, and flattering.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)



 Learn English with... Proverbs 
"Don't burn your bridges behind you." (English proverb)

"Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Walk beside me that we may be as one." (Native American proverb, Ute)

"Experimenting is the great science." (Arabic proverb)

"After rain comes sunshine" (Dutch proverb)



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