as in arrivistes
one who has recently acquired wealth and social position
having made their money in oil decades ago, they consider these billionaire dot-commers mere upstarts
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Recent Examples of upstarts
In addition to the upstarts, this round features big-name programs like North Carolina, Georgia, Texas and USC.
—
Steven Louis Goldstein, New York Times, 5 June 2026
Still, Wall Street remains unconvinced this will be enough to prevent a loss of market share to AI-native products and upstarts.
—Bloomberg, Mercury News, 3 June 2026
Those upstarts include the corporate card contender Ramp, which is raising funds at a $40 billion valuation, according to the Wall Street Journal.
—Ben Weiss, Fortune, 27 May 2026
The team went 7-0-1 down the stretch — including a 3-2 overtime win over Colorado on April 11 — and beat playoff upstarts Utah and Anaheim to advance.
—ABC News, 19 May 2026
Lovable is among a small group of AI coding upstarts — fellow Disruptors Cursor and Replit among them — that are disrupting the way software gets built, relying on natural language descriptions or prompted conversations instead of manual codes.
—Rebecca Fannin, CNBC, 19 May 2026
There are draftniks at ESPN and NBC and the Athletic but also at niche upstarts like Draft Diamonds and Draft Nerds and DraftNasty.
—Dan Greene, New Yorker, 18 May 2026
This October marks the festival’s inaugural run in Miami Beach, but the event is already poised to become a must-attend affair for everyone from independent creatives to brand executives, corporate gurus and scrappy upstarts.
—Caitlin White, Variety, 29 Apr. 2026
Sets from upstarts like Creepy Nuts, Pawsa, Geese and Slayyyter, along with emphatic crowds at rock heavyweights like Jack White, Turnstile and even Sombr, traded seamlessness and precision for immediacy and friction — louder, looser, more physical in ways that were best felt than watched.
—Andrea Domanick, Los Angeles Times, 26 Apr. 2026
Steven Louis Goldstein, New York Times, 5 June 2026
Still, Wall Street remains unconvinced this will be enough to prevent a loss of market share to AI-native products and upstarts.
—Bloomberg, Mercury News, 3 June 2026
Those upstarts include the corporate card contender Ramp, which is raising funds at a $40 billion valuation, according to the Wall Street Journal.
—Ben Weiss, Fortune, 27 May 2026
The team went 7-0-1 down the stretch — including a 3-2 overtime win over Colorado on April 11 — and beat playoff upstarts Utah and Anaheim to advance.
—ABC News, 19 May 2026
Lovable is among a small group of AI coding upstarts — fellow Disruptors Cursor and Replit among them — that are disrupting the way software gets built, relying on natural language descriptions or prompted conversations instead of manual codes.
—Rebecca Fannin, CNBC, 19 May 2026
There are draftniks at ESPN and NBC and the Athletic but also at niche upstarts like Draft Diamonds and Draft Nerds and DraftNasty.
—Dan Greene, New Yorker, 18 May 2026
This October marks the festival’s inaugural run in Miami Beach, but the event is already poised to become a must-attend affair for everyone from independent creatives to brand executives, corporate gurus and scrappy upstarts.
—Caitlin White, Variety, 29 Apr. 2026
Sets from upstarts like Creepy Nuts, Pawsa, Geese and Slayyyter, along with emphatic crowds at rock heavyweights like Jack White, Turnstile and even Sombr, traded seamlessness and precision for immediacy and friction — louder, looser, more physical in ways that were best felt than watched.
—Andrea Domanick, Los Angeles Times, 26 Apr. 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for upstarts
arrivistes
Noun
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And yet, the digital arrivistes could only gain so much traction with a broader customer base and needed a boost from tie-ins with old-school counterparts.—
Brian Steinberg,
Variety,
20 Apr. 2026
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Certainly there’s a long and distinguished tradition of associating Jewish arrivistes with entrepreneurialism, avarice, and clannishness.—
Gideon Lewis-Kraus,
New Yorker,
24 Nov. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Upstarts.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/upstarts. Accessed 9 Jun. 2026.
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