noun
conceit
kuhn-SEET
noun
1
An excessively high opinion of oneself; vanity.
"His conceit made him impossible to work with."
"Despite his fame, he showed no trace of conceit."
2
A clever or fanciful idea, especially one used as a literary device.
"The novel is built around the conceit that the narrator is already dead."
How to Use Conceit
Learner’s notesIn plain EnglishEither excessive pride in oneself, or a clever imaginative idea (especially in writing).
Common mistake
The "vanity" sense and the "literary idea" sense look identical but mean very different things — check context.
Common pairings
full of conceit
a literary conceit
sheer conceit
Word Forms
conceited past tense, conceits plural, conceits singular
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Etymology
From Middle English conceyte, shaped by analogy with pairs like deceive/deceit — ultimately from the same Latin root as "concept."