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If you feel like “a hot air balloon that could go to space” or, perhaps, “like a room without a roof,” you might—with all due respect to Pharrell Williams—be not just happy but ecstatic. In other words: euphoric, over the moon, positively brimming with joy or excitement. Ecstatic has been used in English since the late 1500s, arriving (via Medieval Latin) from the Greek adjective ekstatikós meaning, among other things “out of one’s senses.” Ekstatikós, in turn, was formed in part from eksta-, the stem of such verbs as existánai, “to displace or confound,” and exístasthai “to be astonished or lose consciousness.” That seems an appropriate history for a word that can describe someone who is nearly out of their mind with intense emotion. Eksta-, it should be noted, also contributed to the Greek noun ékstasis, meaning “astonishment” or “trance,” which led to ecstasy (the English word, of course, not the universal feeling).
Examples of ecstatic in a Sentence
Barbara Ehrenreich, Civilization, June/July 2000
… in dietary terms we are veritable troglodytes (which, speaking personally, is all right by me). I think this explains a lot, not least my expanding sense of dismay as the waiter bombarded us with ecstatic descriptions of roulades, ratatouilles, empanadas, langostinos … and goodness knows what else.
—Bill Bryson, I'm a Stranger Here Myself, 1999
He was ecstatic when he heard that he was going to be a father.
a football player who was ecstatic upon receiving a full athletic scholarship to the college of his choice
Shannon Tyler, Idaho Statesman, 1 Aug. 2025
With that in mind, there is one Thoroughbred trainer that is ecstatic since one of his stable stars bent his ear.
—Danny Brewer, Forbes.com, 29 July 2025
After months of visits (and gifts of fresh coffee) the woman finally expressed interest in staying at a shelter, and leaders were ecstatic about where that might lead.
—Blake Nelson, San Diego Union-Tribune, 20 July 2025
The performance of this ecstatic number is powerfully mood-elevating.
—Los Angeles Times, 11 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for ecstatic
Cite this Entry
“Ecstatic.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ecstatic. Accessed 19 Aug. 2025.
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