white elephants

Definition of white elephantsnext
plural of white elephant

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for white elephants
Noun
  • Adapted for television by Adolescence co-creator, Emmy winner Jack Thorne, in Lord of the Flies, innocence descends into savagery when a group of English schoolboys becomes desert island castaways.
    Denise Petski, Deadline, 6 Apr. 2026
  • Each group would later attend a tribal council and vote out the eighth, ninth, and tenth castaways.
    Anthony Robledo, USA Today, 1 Apr. 2026
Noun
  • Stony rubbish, dead trees, the odd corpse in the garden—nothing that couldn’t be absorbed back into the earth.
    Caroline Fraser, The New York Review of Books, 4 Apr. 2026
  • Is all religion rubbish and still ripping us apart…?
    Andy Greene, Rolling Stone, 3 Apr. 2026
Noun
  • The Concentrate, which has earned more than 30,000 positive reviews, makes hot or cold coffee in seconds.
    Tory Johnson, ABC News, 13 Apr. 2026
  • Luostarinen opened the scoring just 23 seconds in, spinning into Samoskevich’s rebound and beating Woll from a tight angle.
    Miami Herald, Miami Herald, 12 Apr. 2026
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.

Browse Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“White elephants.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/white%20elephants. Accessed 16 Apr. 2026.

Love words? Need even more definitions?

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

More from Merriam-Webster