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oomph

Other forms: oomphs

Oomph is an exciting, energetic quality in a person. If you don't have enough oomph, it will be hard to talk your classmates into voting for you for student council president.

The informal noun oomph is a good way to describe a certain aspect of someone's personality that resists being named. If you've got oomph, you're spirited and lively — you could say you've got moxie or pizzazz. Sometimes the word describes a specific kind of attractiveness or desirability: "My brother says he likes that actress because of her oomph." This word dates from the 1930s.

Definitions of oomph
  1. noun
    the activeness of an energetic personality
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    type of:
    activeness, activity
    the trait of being active; moving or acting rapidly and energetically
  2. noun
    powerful attractiveness or desirability
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    types:
    sultriness
    the quality of expressing or arousing sexual desire
    type of:
    attractiveness
    sexual allure
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