enchanting

enchanting — adjective

1. so pleasant, attractive, or beautiful that it completely captures your attention

1.adjectiveB2
Definition

so pleasant, attractive, or beautiful that it completely captures your attention and fills you with delight, in a way that feels magical or dreamlike.

Example

The garden at sunset had an enchanting beauty that left Aiko completely speechless.

collocation: enchanting beauty

Yusuf found the old storyteller's voice truly enchanting as he began his tale.

collocation: enchanting voice

Common collocations
  • enchanting beauty
  • enchanting voice
  • enchanting smile
  • enchanting evening
  • enchanting music
  • enchanting scenery
  • enchanting atmosphere
  • enchanting performance
Synonyms
  • charming

    slightly milder and more social — often describes a person's manner or a small place rather than a spellbinding experience

  • bewitching

    stronger magical connotation; suggests an almost irresistible, mysterious power to attract

  • captivating

    very close in meaning; focuses slightly more on holding attention than on giving delight

  • delightful

    more straightforward and less intense — describes something that simply gives pleasure without the 'magical' overtone

Antonyms
  • repulsive

    strongly unpleasant, causing disgust or strong dislike

  • dull

    lacking in interest or excitement, the opposite of captivating

Usage Note

Most commonly used to describe places, performances, music, voices, and natural scenery. Less commonly applied to food, everyday objects, or practical matters.

Common Mistakes

The soup had an enchanting flavour.
The soup had a wonderful flavour.
'enchanting' is reserved for things that strongly capture the senses or emotions, not for ordinary pleasant experiences.
She felt enchanting when she heard the news.
She felt enchanted when she heard the news.
'enchanting' describes the thing that causes delight; 'enchanted' describes the person who experiences it.

Word family

  • enchant
    verbB2
  • enchanted
    adjectiveB2
  • enchantment
    nounC1
  • enchanter
    nounC1
  • enchantress
    nounC1
  • disenchantment
    nounC1

Synonym discussion

Sense: adjective/1

Enchanting sits on a spectrum of positive descriptors. Compared to charming, which often refers to a warm, socially pleasing quality (a charming host, a charming village), enchanting carries a stronger sense of magical or dreamlike absorption. Bewitching is even stronger and more mysterious — it suggests an almost irresistible hypnotic pull, as in a bewitching gaze. Captivating overlaps heavily with enchanting but emphasises the holding of attention (a captivating story) rather than the feeling of delight. Delightful is the most everyday word of the group — it describes something that simply gives pleasure (a delightful picnic) without the intensity or magical overtone. If something is enchanting, it does more than please you — it pulls you into a different mood or world, leaving you spellbound. For example: a candlelit concert in a cathedral might be enchanting; a friendly neighbour is charming; a mysterious stranger's eyes might be bewitching; a good joke is delightful.

charming ↗bewitchingcaptivatingdelightful ↗

Common collocations

Nouns

Adverbs

  • absolutely enchanting
  • utterly enchanting
  • truly enchanting
  • simply enchanting

Phrases

  • find someone/something enchanting
  • have an enchanting quality

Etymology

LatinFrenchEnglish

Enchanting comes from the verb enchant, which entered English through Old French enchanter, meaning 'to cast a spell on'. That in turn comes from Latin incantare — 'to sing a magic spell upon' — formed from in- ('upon, into') and cantare ('to sing'). So the literal root is 'to sing magic words'. The shift from literal magic to a metaphor for anything powerfully delightful happened by the 16th century.