déjà vu

noun

dé·jà vu ˌdā-ˌzhä-ˈvü

-ˈvᵫ

: the illusion of remembering scenes and events when experienced for the first time

: a feeling that one has seen or heard something before

Despite a blond, swept-back mane all his own, Fonda looks startlingly like his father, Henry … . He even moves like his father, only dispelling the eerie feeling of déjà vu when he opens his mouth.—

Peter Biskind

: something overly or unpleasantly familiar

The team's poor start to the season was déjà vu for its long-suffering fans.

Example Sentences

I entered the room and immediately felt a sense of déjà vu. When the car broke down again, it was déjà vu. The rise in housing costs is déjà vu all over again.

Recent Examples on the Web Gene & Jean Thibedeau, a married pair of community college professors from New Mexico who wear sensible footwear and suffer from the most extreme case of deja vu this timeline has ever seen. —

Lauren Huff, EW.com, 25 Feb. 2023 New Year’s Eve, which used to be celebrated globally with a free-spirited wildness, felt instead like a case of deja vu, with the fast-spreading omicron variant again filling hospitals. —

John Leicester, chicagotribune.com, 1 Jan. 2022 New Year’s Eve, which used to be celebrated globally with a free-spirited wildness, felt instead like a case of deja vu, with the fast-spreading omicron variant again filling hospitals. —

John Leicester, Nick Perry, Anchorage Daily News, 1 Jan. 2022 There's been a bit of 2021 deja vu to start the year. —

Gunjan Banerji, WSJ, 7 Feb. 2023 Every year when the list of new bills for the Indiana legislative session posts, Hoosiers may feel dizzy with deja vu. —

Sarah Bowman, The Indianapolis Star, 30 Jan. 2023 Given how the first round went, the deja vu could be bad news for Walker. —

Time, 6 Dec. 2022 Voters might be hit with deja vu listening to such statements. —

Joseph Morton, Dallas News, 7 Nov. 2022 Now the conversations surrounding Mielle have invoked a feeling of deja vu for some consumers. —

Janay Kingsberry, Washington Post, 5 Jan. 2023 See More

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