big fish in a small pond
UK/bɪɡ ˈfɪʃ ɪn ə smɔːl ˈpɒnd/US/bɪɡ ˈfɪʃ ɪn ə smɔl ˈpɑnd/
big fish in a small pond noun: one who has achieved a high rank or is highly esteemed, but only in a small, relatively unimportant, or little known location or organization.
Noun
big fish in a small pond (plural big fish in small ponds or big fish in a small pond)
- One who has achieved a high rank or is highly esteemed, but only in a small, relatively unimportant, or little known location or organization.
- Dr. Jones could get a professorship at an Ivy League university, but he enjoys being a big fish in a small pond too much to ever leave Hannover College.
- [Arnold] Toynbee worries about the psychosomatic effects when an individual has a constant stature yet finds himself living in complexes of ever-increasing magnitude. In a community small enough to identify with, yet large enough to offer sufficient choices, man need not be either a big fish in a...1969, Athelstan Spilhaus, “Technology, Living Cities, and Human Environment”, in Science & Technology and the Cities: Committee on Science and Astronautics, U.S. House of Representatives: A...
- Antonyms:
- small fish in a big pond
Examples of big fish in a small pond in a sentence
- In a community small enough to identify with, yet large enough to offer sufficient choices, man need not be either a big fish in a small pond or a small fish in a big pond.1969, Athelstan Spilhaus, “Technology, Living Cities, and Human Environment”, in Science & Technology and the Cities: Committee on Science...
- No doubt many would feel that being a big fish in a small pond for a small time is not enough.1985, John Burnheim, “Is Demarchy Possible?”, in Is Democracy Possible?: The Alternative to Electoral Politics, Berkeley; Los Angeles...
- He [Jack Spicer] had come to New York to escape the claustrophobia of being a big fish in a small pond, and to make his way as a writer.1998, Lewis Ellingham, Kevin Killian, “The Poet in New York (and Boston)”, in Poet be Like God: Jack Spicer and the San Francisco...
- Indeed, Josh [White]'s status throughout the 1950s would often be that of a big fish in a small pond.2000, Elijah Wald, “Josh at Midnight: 1954–1958”, in Josh White: Society Blues, Amherst, Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press, →ISBN...
Synonyms of big fish in a small pond
Antonyms
- small fish in a big pond
Forms of big fish in a small pond
| plural | big fish in small ponds |
|---|---|
| plural | big fish in a small pond |
Questions about big fish in a small pond
- What does big fish in a small pond mean?
- Big fish in a small pond means one who has achieved a high rank or is highly esteemed, but only in a small, relatively unimportant, or little known location or organization.
- How do you use big fish in a small pond in a sentence?
- In a community small enough to identify with, yet large enough to offer sufficient choices, man need not be either a big fish in a small pond or a small fish in a big pond.
- What part of speech is big fish in a small pond?
- Big fish in a small pond is a noun.
- How do you pronounce big fish in a small pond?
- Big fish in a small pond is pronounced /bɪɡ ˈfɪʃ ɪn ə smɔːl ˈpɒnd/ (UK).
- What is the plural of big fish in a small pond?
- The plural of big fish in a small pond is big fish in small ponds.
Words near big fish in a small pond in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: big fish in a small pond (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-big fish in a small pond.ogg.
Cite this entry: “big fish in a small pond.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/big_fish_in_a_small_pond. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.