Synonyms for pretend
Definitions
- v. 1
To speak or behave so as to give a false or simulated appearance.
You don't have to pretend to like the soup.
- v. 2
To speak or behave so as to give a false or simulated appearance. To engage in make-believe.
She didn't have a real piano to play, so she just pretended.
- v. 3
To speak or behave so as to give a false or simulated appearance. To feign, affect (a state, quality, etc.).
She's pretending illness to get out of the business meeting.
- v. 4
To lay claim (to an ability, status, advantage, etc.).
The family's exile was intended to stop them pretending to the throne.
Related words
- Word family
- pretended pretender pretense pretension pretentious pretentiousness
- Phrases
- make pretend
Forms
- Past participle
- pretended
e.g. pretended → represented, feigned, shammed, affected…
Choose the right word
If he takes to himself the credit and appearance of qualities he does not possess, he is said to affect or feign, or to pretend to, the character he thus assumes.
J. C. Fernald, English Synonyms and Antonyms (1914)
Example sentences
- sham This sham election is a disgrace to democracy.
- feign It is difficult for those who are sad to feign joy.
- guess I guess the time of reckoning has arrived at last.
- profess Fadil wrote Layla a poem to profess his love.
- assume I assume that at some point Tom will just give up.
- disguise Your affection was just a transaction in disguise.
By length
- 3 letters
- act1
- 4 letters
- make1, play1, sham1
- 5 letters
- guess1, claim1, feign1
- 6 letters
- affect2, assume2, hazard2, allege2
- 7 letters
- venture2, profess2
- 8 letters
- disguise2, simulate3, propound2
- 9 letters
- represent3
- 11 letters
- counterfeit3
The small number after each word is its number of syllables (affect2 = 2 syllables).
In other languages
- Français
- faire semblant
- Deutsch
- vortäuschen
- Català
- fer com si