outlandish

adjective out·land·ish \ ˌau̇t-ˈlan-dish \

|Updated on: 21 Jun 2018

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Examples: outlandish in a Sentence

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Definition of outlandish

1 : of or relating to another country : foreign

saw many outlandish animals at the zoo

2 a : strikingly out of the ordinary : bizarre

an outlandish costume

Her book is filled with outlandish characters.

spun some outlandish tales

b : exceeding proper or reasonable limits or standards

workers complain of outlandish hours
—Joan E. Rigdon

outlandish government specifications

3 : remote from civilization

no other young men foolish enough to offer to go to such an outlandish station
—Geog. Jour.

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outlandishly

adverb

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outlandishness

noun

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Examples of outlandish in a Sentence

She fills her books with outlandish characters.
The actress wore an outlandish dress to the awards ceremony.

Recent Examples of outlandish from the Web

Together, the trio have created a place exceptional enough that charging twenty-five dollars for a twelve-inch pizza doesn’t seem outlandish.

— hannah goldfield, The New Yorker, "Una Pizza Napoletana Sets a High Bar," 15 June 2018
The idea would have seemed outlandish to anyone looking at the alien, lifeless landscape not so long ago.

— Fox News, "How Germany is turning wasteland into vast lakeside resorts," 14 June 2018
The idea would have seemed outlandish to anyone looking at the alien, lifeless landscape not so long ago.

— Washington Post, "How Germany is turning wasteland into vast lakeside resorts," 14 June 2018
Los Angeles Times Ken Ludwig specializes both in placing his characters in weird, outlandish situations and in propelling them out of peril at breakneck speed.

— timesoc, latimes.com, "TimesOC: O.C. supervisors oppose needle exchange plan," 13 June 2018
Yet only 18 months ago such talk would have seemed outlandish.

— The Economist, "Xiaomi eyes a giant Chinese IPO," 10 May 2018
LaVar Ball has returned from his nearly four-month stint with his sons in Lithuania, which means LaVar Ball is back to saying outlandish things about his basketball-playing sons.

— andrew joseph, For The Win, "LaVar Ball on if Kawhi Leonard is a better player than Lonzo Ball: 'Hell no'," 8 May 2018
At the moment that presently seems outlandish to me.

— ken goe, OregonLive.com, "On fitting 17,000 temporary seats into the new Hayward Field: Oregon track & field rundown," 25 Apr. 2018
Many of the truths about this cult will seem outlandish at first glance, beginning with the opening one.

— win mccormack, The New Republic, "Outside the Limits of the Human Imagination," 27 Mar. 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'outlandish.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Did You Know?

In olden times, English speakers used the phrase outlandish man to refer to a foreigner - or, one who came from an outland, which originally meant "a foreign land." From here, outlandish broadened in usage from a word meaning "from another land" to one describing something unfamiliar or strange. Dress was a common early target for the adjective - Henry Fielding, in Tom Jones (1749), writes of a woman who was drest in one of your outlandish Garments. Nowadays, the word can be applied to anything that strikes us as out of the ordinary, as in the description of one man’s outlandish proposal to replace the aging Tappan Zee Bridge with a seven-mile tunnel, from the New York Times, September 16, 2001.

First Known Use of outlandish

before 12th century

in the meaning defined at sense 1

See Words from the same year

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outlandish Synonyms

Synonyms

exotic, fantastic (also fantastical), glamorous (also glamourous), marvelous (or marvellous), romantic, strange;

Antonyms

familiar, nonexotic, nonglamorous, unexotic, unglamorous, unromantic;

alien, foreign;

dark, distant, faraway, remote;

alluring, captivating, enchanting, fascinating, magical;

Synonym Discussion of outlandish

strange, singular, unique, peculiar, eccentric, erratic, odd, quaint, outlandish mean departing from what is ordinary, usual, or to be expected. strange stresses unfamiliarity and may apply to the foreign, the unnatural, the unaccountable.