How to Use pretentious in a Sentence

pretentious

adjective
  • The houses in the neighborhood are large and pretentious.
  • These guys weren’t pretentious, and there weren’t these walls.
    — Brian McCollum, Detroit Free Press, 17 Apr. 2022
  • But Keens is not a pretentious place.
    — Charlie Hobbs, Condé Nast Traveler, 31 Dec. 2025
  • Well-healed but not pretentious.
    — Condé Nast, Condé Nast Traveler, 25 May 2026
  • Singing sweet tunes about wanting to be a young adult again is a bit pretentious.
    — cleveland.com, 25 Aug. 2017
  • This is all sorts of pretentious wannabee art-house nonsense at this point.
    — Erik Kain, Forbes, 9 Feb. 2024
  • Even our waiter — who was so over the whole thing — called it pretentious.
    — Mike Sutter, ExpressNews.com, 2 Jan. 2020
  • These wooly, small- to medium-sized pups aren't pretentious in the least.
    — Katarina Avendano, Good Housekeeping, 25 Aug. 2022
  • That doesn’t change the fact that those pretentious snobs can make some of the greatest works in the world.
    — Addie Morfoot, Variety, 12 Nov. 2022
  • Though pours can reach up to $500 per ounce, this is not a pretentious place.
    — Amanda Hancock, The Courier-Journal, 29 July 2024
  • Many fans understand the phrase to be about a pretentious movie.
    — Armando Tinoco, Deadline, 21 Jan. 2025
  • Her goal is to make wine less pretentious and more approachable.
    — San Diego Union-Tribune, 23 Sep. 2019
  • The vibe of this full moon is talkative, loud, and even pretentious.
    — Sophie Saint Thomas, Allure, 25 Apr. 2022
  • If all of this sounds dreadfully pretentious to you, well, step off.
    — Jason Pettigrew, SPIN, 17 Aug. 2022
  • To that end, each item is crafted by hand, without pretentious airs or hefty price tags.
    — Tribune News Service, cleveland, 29 Dec. 2020
  • If that’s not the most pretentious thing that anybody’s ever said.
    — Andrew Unterberger, Billboard, 25 Oct. 2022
  • This will strike some of you as very, very pretentious and self-indulgent, but bear with me.
    — Momus, WIRED, 16 Jan. 2007
  • Think fine dining but not pretentious.
    — Eddie Fontanez, AZCentral.com, 18 Feb. 2026
  • Trust the French to come up with the most pretentious word in the dictionary.
    — Dwight Garner, New York Times, 28 Apr. 2025
  • But none of that does much to camouflage a core drama that’s pretentious and dull.
    — David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 14 Apr. 2026
  • Too big, too pretentious and then there is the near windowless media bunker.
    — John Cherwa, latimes.com, 29 Sep. 2017
  • Bottles range from about a pound at the light end to more than two pounds for those pretentious behemoths.
    — Washington Post, 15 Oct. 2021
  • And for those who might still view fashion as pretentious without humor?
    — Ritu Upadhyay, Footwear News, 30 Dec. 2025
  • Notice that as always the crime, the great shame, is the social one, to seem pretentious.
    — John Jeremiah Sullivan, GQ, 28 Jan. 2018
  • Pop culture had, in the past, spoofed and satirized the pretentious wine drinker.
    — Alex Abad-Santos, Vox, 17 July 2019
  • The series has always struck me as more pretentious than profound.
    — Kristi Turnquist, OregonLive.com, 4 June 2017
  • Go to a famous, cold museum, full of art that is both pretentious and boring.
    — Grace Henes, The New Yorker, 23 Aug. 2022
  • That might be a pretty pretentious name for a single malt scotch, but there’s a story behind it.
    — Jonah Flicker, Robb Report, 13 Nov. 2025
  • The use of her royal title is beyond pretentious.
    — Stephanie Nolasco , Ashley Papa, FOXNews.com, 25 Nov. 2025
  • Need to drop a levity bomb in the middle of a group of pretentious characters?
    — Brian Truitt, USA Today, 18 Oct. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'pretentious.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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