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Lackluster may describe things that are dull, but the word itself is no yawn. In its earliest uses in the early 17th century, lackluster (also spelled lacklustre) usually described eyes that were dull or lacking in brightness, as in “a lackluster stare.” Later, it came to describe other things whose sheen had been removed; Charles Dickens, in his 1844 novel Martin Chuzzlewit, writes of the faded image of the dragon on the sign outside a village alehouse: “many a wintry storm of rain, snow, sleet, and hail, had changed his colour from a gaudy blue to a faint lack-lustre shade of grey.” These days lackluster is broadly used to describe anything blah, from a spiritless sensation to a humdrum hump day.
Examples of lackluster in a Sentence
Andrew McGowan, Variety, 14 July 2025
But the mess went beyond the kind of lackluster romance: fans scoured each of the contestants’ digital footprints better than the producers had.
—Brittany Spanos, Rolling Stone, 14 July 2025
But don’t lose sight of the statement Schoen and Daboll are trying to make with an offense that is practically a mirror image of last year’s lackluster group:
Jones, the quarterback, was the problem.
—Pat Leonard, Hartford Courant, 14 July 2025
Your LinkedIn profile is your digital business card, but most professionals waste it with lackluster content that fails to generate meaningful connections.
—Caroline Castrillon, Forbes.com, 13 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for lackluster
Cite this Entry
“Lackluster.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lackluster. Accessed 21 Jul. 2025.
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lackluster
adjective
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