Definition of personatenext
as in to play
to pretend to be (what one is not) in appearance or behavior likes to personate the man of the world, but he's still the small-town hick that he always was

Synonyms & Similar Words

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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 personate Till’s motifs swept though the ensemble, as horns, clarinets, bassoons, violin all had a chance to personate the character. — By Libby Hanssen, kansascity.com, 3 June 2017
Recent Examples of Synonyms for personate
Verb
  • The 6-foot-9, 240-pound Purdue transfer, cleared by the courts to play courtesy of a preliminary injunction in a lawsuit against the NCAA, came off the bench to score nine points on 4-of-5 shooting.
    — Gary Bedore, Kansas City Star, 3 Nov. 2026
  • That forced Edmonds and former Horned Frog David Punch (now at Texas) to play lengthy minutes and have to worry about foul trouble.
    — Steven Johnson, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 3 Nov. 2026
Verb
  • Fielder has made a career out of constructing elaborate social experiments, like building exact replicas of people’s homes and hiring actors to impersonate their loved ones on The Rehearsal.
    — Maxwell Adler, Vanity Fair, 27 Oct. 2026
  • Some scammers impersonate candidates to solicit fraudulent contributions.
    — Kurt Knutsson, FOXNews.com, 27 Oct. 2026
Verb
  • Criminals can imitate those messages to create panic and lure people toward fake login pages.
    — Kurt Knutsson, FOXNews.com, 28 Oct. 2026
  • Musks imitate the feeling of a luxe fabric, soft and skin-like, as a fresh set of Frette bedsheets.
    — Loren Savini, Allure, 27 Oct. 2026
Verb
  • As proof of how much of a joke this has become for people is that a sketch mocking their drama was part of the October 10 episode of Saturday Night Live UK.
    — Lizzie Lanuza, StyleCaster, 21 Oct. 2026
  • There were earlier versions of this story that were openly mocking of Kip, versions that threw Leo under the bus for being too sly; versions that were too overtly political; versions with ghosts that didn’t need to be there, and so on.
    — Deborah Treisman, New Yorker, 18 Oct. 2026
Verb
  • Beckman portrayed the first lady's work on the ceasefire as an extension of her efforts to help reunite Russian and Ukrainian children with their families after they were separated by Russia's war against Ukraine.
    — BEN FINLEY, Arkansas Online, 24 Oct. 2026
  • Pundits continue to portray the Taiwan Strait as the world’s most dangerous flashpoint; the summit’s agenda suggested otherwise.
    — Ningrong Liu, Fortune, 23 Oct. 2026
Verb
  • So Concordia researchers developed this novel material that can act as both.
    — Maria Mocerino, Interesting Engineering, 2 Nov. 2026
  • As the church falls apart, its demolition imminent, the work acts as an acknowledgment of the life that exists within materials, of how intention and attention can come together to bring out the sense of meaning inherent to a place.
    — Kristian Vistrup Madsen, Artforum, 1 Nov. 2026

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Cite this Entry

“Personate.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/personate. Accessed 4 Nov. 2026.

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