poster child

poster child noun: one who is a prototypical or quintessential example of something.

Noun

poster child (plural poster children)

(Canada, US, idiomatic) One who is a prototypical or quintessential example of something.
- He's a poster child for militant vegetarianism.
- I think he smile could have opened the door by itself. It seemed to have a life of it’s^([sic]) own with snow-white teeth below sparkling blue eyes. Its owner could be the poster child for the expression “grinning from ear to ear.”2005, Susan Cunningham, “Poster Child”, in Unwrapping the Sandwich Generation. Life Vignettes about Seniors & Their Adult Boomer Children, Morgan James Publishing, →ISBN, page 175

“He’s not exactly a poster child for the average well-adjusted American kid.2006, Ted Dekker, Bill Bright, Blessed Child, Thomas Nelson, →ISBN, page 77:
In the United States, thawing temperatures make Alaskan mountains the poster child of emerging landslide threats, says Higman.2026 February 27, Paul Salopek, “Hazard Cascade”, in National Geographic:

plural	poster children
alternative form	posterchild

From the usage of appealing young people and children in charitable advertisements.

What does poster child mean?: Poster child means one who is a prototypical or quintessential example of something.
How do you use poster child in a sentence?: “He’s not exactly a poster child for the average well-adjusted American kid.
What part of speech is poster child?: Poster child is a noun.
What is the plural of poster child?: The plural of poster child is poster children.

Adapted from Wiktionary: poster child (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: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-poster child.ogg.

Cite this entry: “poster child.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/poster_child. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.