Word.ws English Dictionary

putting on airs

putting on airs is the present participle of put on airs.

Meaning of put on airs

Verb

put on airs (third-person singular simple present puts on airs, present participle putting on airs, simple past and past participle put on airs)

  1. (idiomatic) To become haughty, to assume a pretentious manner.
    • Even Timothy, the jointed wooden lion, who was made by the disabled soldiers, and should have had broader views, put on airs and pretended he was connected with Government.1921 June, Margery Williams, “The Velveteen Rabbit: Or How Toys Become Real”, in Harper’s Bazar, volume LVI, number 6 (2504 overall), New York, N.Y.: International Magazine Company, →ISSN, →OCLC

Questions about putting on airs

What is putting on airs the present participle of?
Putting on airs is the present participle of put on airs.

Words near putting on airs in the dictionary

  1. putting off
  2. putting on
  3. putting on a brave face
  4. putting on a clinic
  5. putting on a pedestal
  6. putting on airs
  7. putting on frills
  8. putting on one's dancing shoes
  9. putting on one's own oxygen mask first
  10. putting on one's oxygen mask first
  11. putting on the block

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: putting on airs (page history and authors); put on airs (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.

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Cite this entry: “putting on airs.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/putting_on_airs. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.