old hat

adjective

1
2
: lacking in freshness : trite

Examples of old hat in a Sentence

I suppose my favorite joke's a bit old hat by now. Making hit movies is old hat for him.
Recent Examples on the Web The action of being frenetic and trying to search for your legally winning gotcha was old hat. Lance Eliot, Forbes, 19 Feb. 2024 For the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers, getting to the conference title game is becoming old hat. Josh Dubow, USA TODAY, 24 Jan. 2024 If all of that is rudimentary and old hat to you, the spa offers more esoteric treatments. Carole Sovocool, Robb Report, 22 Dec. 2023 By then, the spectacle of a former President being indicted had gone from unprecedented to old hat. Jelani Cobb, The New Yorker, 3 Sep. 2023 In an age when health is wealth, hotel spas have, ironically, become old hat. Jillian Dara, Robb Report, 25 May 2023 Lloyd Webber claims the marketing of the show had become old hat, and allowed interest to atrophy. Peter Marks, Washington Post, 18 Mar. 2023 Carol Willis, president and director of Lower Manhattan’s Skyscraper Museum, contends that the thrill ride atop the midtown hotel is, in a way, old hat. Karrie Jacobs, Curbed, 18 July 2023 Even then, the hoax—recycling the Roswell myth, which holds that the U.S. government in 1947 recovered an alien craft from the New Mexico desert—was old hat. Keith Kloor, Scientific American, 27 June 2023

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'old hat.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1911, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of old hat was in 1911

Dictionary Entries Near old hat

Cite this Entry

“Old hat.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/old%20hat. Accessed 28 Mar. 2024.

More from Merriam-Webster on old hat

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!