elegant

elegant — adjective

1. having a graceful, well-proportioned quality in how someone or something looks,

1.adjectiveB1
Definition

having a graceful, well-proportioned quality in how someone or something looks, moves, or behaves, so that the overall effect feels pleasing and carefully chosen.

Example

Hugo looked elegant in his dark suit and polished leather shoes.

collocation: elegant suit

The hotel dining room had an elegant design with tall windows and candles.

Common collocations
  • elegant suit
  • elegant dress
  • elegant manners
  • elegant design
  • elegant style
  • elegant appearance
  • elegant handwriting
  • elegant solution
Synonyms
  • graceful

    focuses more on smooth, flowing movement than on overall style

  • refined

    emphasises cultivated taste and politeness rather than visual beauty

  • stylish

    stresses current fashion and trendiness; less formal than elegant

  • sophisticated

    implies worldly experience and complex taste; broader than visual appearance

Antonyms
  • clumsy

    lacking grace in movement or design

  • tacky

    showy or cheap in an unattractive way

Grammar Patterns

elegant + noun

be + elegant

look/feel/find + elegant

Usage Note

Frequently collocates with clothing (elegant suit, elegant dress), architecture (elegant building, elegant room), personal style (elegant manners, elegant writing), and natural or artistic movements (elegant walk, elegant dance).

Common Mistakes

The weather was elegant today.
The weather was beautiful today.
elegant describes refined grace or style, not general pleasantness.
He gave an elegant meal for the guests.
He gave an elegant dinner for the guests.
elegant collocates with dinner/party, not with meal as a dish.

2. describing a theory, plan, or method that is both impressively simple and clever

2.adjectiveB2
Definition

describing a theory, plan, or method that is both impressively simple and cleverly effective — achieving its purpose with no unnecessary steps or parts.

Example

The engineer proposed an elegant solution using just one small motor instead of ten.

elegant solution — common academic collocation

Cyrus found an elegant way to sort the files by color on the computer.

Common collocations
  • elegant solution
  • elegant proof
  • elegant method
  • elegant design
  • elegant way
  • elegant in its simplicity
  • elegant system
Synonyms
  • neat

    less formal and slightly weaker than elegant; common in everyday speech

  • ingenious

    emphasises originality and cleverness more than simplicity

Antonyms
  • clumsy

    awkward or poorly designed, lacking elegance in execution

  • complicated

    needlessly complex, the opposite of simple and clean

Grammar Patterns

elegant + solution/plan/theory/method

elegant in + possessive + simplicity/design

Usage Note

Used almost exclusively for abstract things — solutions, proofs, methods, theories, designs. Never used for people, places, or concrete objects in this sense (use sense 1 GRACEFUL & STYLISH instead). Distinguish from sense 1 by whether the praise is about visual grace or about intellectual neatness.

Common Mistakes

She wore an elegant dress to the party' (meaning clever).
She wore an elegant dress to the party' (this matches sense 1 only). For the clever-and-simple meaning, use with abstract nouns: 'an elegant solution.

Word family

  • elegance
    nounB2
  • elegantly
    adverbB2
  • inelegant
    adjectiveC1

Synonym discussion

Sense: adjective/1

All four words describe a positive impression of appearance or manner, but they highlight different qualities. Graceful focuses on smooth, flowing movement — a ballet dancer is graceful, but a well-decorated room is not. Refined suggests cultivated taste and politeness (refined manners, refined palate) rather than visual beauty. Stylish is about current fashion and trends; it is more casual and can feel superficial compared to elegant. Sophisticated implies worldly experience and complex understanding, so it can apply to wine, music, or conversation in ways that elegant cannot. Choose elegant when you want to describe someone or something that is pleasing through a combination of grace, style, and careful taste — for example, "an elegant silk dress" or "an elegant handwritten letter."

graceful ↗refined ↗stylish ↗sophisticated ↗

Common collocations

Nouns

Adverbs

  • elegantly
  • quite elegant
  • very elegant
  • particularly elegant

Phrases

  • elegant in its simplicity

Prepositions

  • elegant in
  • elegant of

Etymology

LatinFrenchEnglish

Elegant comes from the Latin word 'elegantem', meaning 'choice, fine, tasteful'. This in turn came from the verb 'eligere' ('to choose, select'), which combined 'ex-' ('out of') and 'legere' ('to gather, pick'). The idea was that something elegant had been carefully chosen or selected. The word passed into Middle French as 'élégant' and then into English in the 1400s, originally describing refined taste and later extending to graceful appearance and clever simplicity.