mot juste

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mot juste

/məʊˈʒuːst/ UK

Rhymes with -uːst

Where it comes from

Unadapted borrowing from French mot juste.

noun mots justes

The perfectly appropriate word or phrase for the situation. She legged it, and for a moment silence reigned. Then Bobbie said, “Phew!” and I agreed that “Phew!” was the mot juste.
Similar: winged word

Translations

Every language

noun perfectly appropriate word or phrase

中文	最貼切的字眼 /最贴切的字眼 zuì tiēqiè de zìyǎn
Français	mot juste
Deutsch	richtiger / passender / zutreffender Ausdruck, richtiges / passendes / treffendes Wort

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MLA

"mot juste." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/mot%20juste. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

mot juste. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/mot%20juste

Chicago

"mot juste." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/mot%20juste.

BibTeX

@misc{mot_juste_2026,
  title = {mot juste},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/mot%20juste},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}