fetching

adjective

fetch·​ing ˈfe-chiŋ How to pronounce fetching (audio)
: attractive, appealing
a fetching smile
… actress Melanie Griffith, looking very fetching in a light-green silk dress and double diamond stud earrings.Robert Goldberg
If you tune your clock-radio to station 1540 in Charlotte, North Carolina, you wake up with a fetching female voice at your ear.Arline Brecher
There is something sweet and fetching about the episode.Newgate Callendar
From Ukrainian borscht to Vietnamese crab omelette, there is much to choose from, and all in all it's a fetching collection …Publishers Weekly
fetchingly adverb
fetchingly dressed
Tasting plates generally consist of four to six bites of food, often lined up fetchingly on long, narrow white plates that curl at the edges. Harvey Steiman

Examples of fetching in a Sentence

You look very fetching in that outfit. the woman's fetching smile has long made the painting a favorite with visitors to the museum
Recent Examples on the Web This process of programmatically fetching data — through API calls or requests — is commonly used to update other dashboards and maps set up by the city. Nami Sumida, San Francisco Chronicle, 10 Feb. 2023 The unlikely progress through the story of Gussie Carnegie — the producer’s secretary, then wife, then star, then ex, but in reverse — suddenly seems clear and, in Krystal Joy Brown’s fetching performance, charming if not credible. Jesse Green, New York Times, 12 Dec. 2022 Visit the burial site of Ham the Astrochimp, a fetching primate who uneventfully but quite involuntarily plunged through the mesopause himself in 1961. John Phillips, Car and Driver, 9 Jan. 2023 Each is rubbed with a fetching assortment of spices before being slowly coaxed to tenderness by pitmaster Brad Hudetz in the restaurant’s massive Oyler smoker from J&R Manufacturing. Nick Kindelsperger, Chicago Tribune, 28 Dec. 2022 This fetching flask would please any whiskey drinker with a sense of style. Jonah Flicker, Robb Report, 8 Dec. 2022 Running the length of the dining room is a long blond banquette; walls are alternately painted in fetching blue waves and elegant graffiti. Tom Sietsema, Washington Post, 21 Nov. 2022 Moxi is essentially a helper for staff nurses, performing logistical tasks such as fetching drugs and delivering lab samples. David Meyer, Fortune, 16 Nov. 2022 Here's a fetching label on a bottle that could double as a prop in the show. Mark Stock, Men's Health, 11 Nov. 2022

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'fetching.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1880, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of fetching was in 1880

Dictionary Entries Near fetching

Cite this Entry

“Fetching.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fetching. Accessed 18 Mar. 2024.

Kids Definition

fetching

adjective
fetch·​ing ˈfech-iŋ How to pronounce fetching (audio)
: attractive, pleasing
a fetching smile
fetchingly adverb

More from Merriam-Webster on fetching

Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!