How to Use portmanteau in a Sentence

portmanteau

noun
  • The portmanteau refers to more than the 52-year-old actress’s high-profile roles.
    Carina Chocano, Town & Country, 23 Oct. 2019
  • The flavor mashup even has a cheeky portmanteau: swicy.
    Tina Danze, Dallas News, 5 May 2023
  • Shacket is a portmanteau of the words shirt and jacket.
    Nneya Richards, Travel + Leisure, 3 May 2023
  • The town crafted the portmanteau name Anaheim — Ana for the river, and Heim, the German word for home.
    Patt Morrison, Los Angeles Times, 10 Aug. 2023
  • The idea was called a rockoon—a portmanteau of rocket and balloon.
    David Howard, Popular Mechanics, 30 Aug. 2020
  • The winery was the first to use the word Meritage — a portmanteau of merit and heritage — on its Bordeaux-style red wines.
    Washington Post, 5 May 2022
  • The name is a portmanteau of Kismet, or fate, and kinetic, the energy of movement.
    John Tufts, The Indianapolis Star, 6 Feb. 2023
  • The word is a portmanteau or a combination of two words — glamorous and camping.
    Clare Mulroy, USA TODAY, 11 Sep. 2022
  • Fans of the lead characters created the portmanteau Sameena, casting scenes from the movies as Taylor Swift songs.
    Isaac Feldberg, Vulture, 5 Aug. 2021
  • Her name is a portmanteau of Van Gogh and Madonna; her true identity is unknown.
    Meagan Fredette, refinery29.com, 7 July 2018
  • HengTen’s name is a portmanteau made up of the first characters for Chinese names of Evergrande and Tencent.
    Rebecca Davis, Variety, 19 Nov. 2021
  • The BioSync suspension—stretchy mesh panels connecting the shoulders to the hipbelt—proved to be more than just cute portmanteau.
    Joe Jackson, Outside Online, 21 May 2019
  • But many have kept it simple and just posted the picture with its revolting portmanteau of a caption.
    Washington Post, 24 Oct. 2019
  • Other names for the practice include nibbling, pick-up meal, alchemy, kitchen sink, deja vu and the fun portmanteau, plannedovers.
    G. Daniela Galarza, Washington Post, 21 July 2022
  • This was suspect enough in the early aughts, even if Bennifer was the first modern-day celebrity couple to inspire a portmanteau.
    Michelle Ruiz, Vogue, 26 July 2021
  • The word 'fappening' is a portmanteau of the words 'fap' (masturbate) and 'happening'.
    Vicky Spratt, refinery29.com, 11 Jan. 2021
  • The show takes place on the Florida Panhandle, which stretches out to Alabama – hence the portmanteau name.
    Emma Dibdin, Cosmopolitan, 1 Nov. 2017
  • Kaiem itself is a portmanteau of the names of her grandmother, Nakai, and her mother, Emma, whose entrepreneurship inspired the brand.
    Meghan McCormick, Forbes, 23 Oct. 2021
  • For guests who don’t want to go home after work, the industry has created the latest portmanteau — the workcation.
    Washington Post, 8 Oct. 2020
  • SuTi — a portmanteau of the founders’ first names — currently offers two products.
    Kevin Gray, Dallas News, 19 May 2021
  • The term is a portmanteau of oligarch and siloviki, a Russian word for the country’s military and security elite.
    John Hyatt, Forbes, 14 Mar. 2022
  • The name is a portmanteau of its main ingredients: bananas and toffee pudding.
    Casey Barber, CNN, 14 Mar. 2022
  • Tyra Banks is a woman of many jobs: An iconic supermodel known for her charismatic walk and for coining the portmanteau smize.
    Tahirah Hairston, The Cut, 9 Oct. 2017
  • Like laze, this portmanteau sews together two words—volcano and smog—to describe the acidic haze that commonly forms due to volcanic emissions.
    Maya Wei-Haas, Smithsonian, 25 May 2018
  • Recent studies have found that contrails (a portmanteau of condensation and trails) may contribute as much as or more than all flights to the warming of the planet.
    Alex Davies, Wired, 2 Mar. 2020
  • Chigga, a seventeen-year-old Internet star, was born and raised in Jakarta but is of Chinese descent, hence the portmanteau.
    Wei Tchou, The New Yorker, 7 June 2017
  • Pitch a tent at one of the many campgrounds or cozy up in a hillside yurt at Treebones, which has been offering glamorous camping since well before someone coined the clever portmanteau.
    Sarah Feldberg, SFChronicle.com, 3 July 2019
  • The fact that this unexpected portmanteau also managed to fill our bellies, and produce enough leftovers to feed us for many chilly nights to come, made it all the more enjoyable.
    Amiel Stanek, Bon Appétit, 5 Mar. 2020
  • That nickname is a portmanteau of Bombay, a center of filmmaking that is now called Mumbai, and Hollywood.
    Rajesh Roy, WSJ, 13 Sep. 2022
  • One of my biggest concerns was balancing work and vacation, and not tipping the portmanteau scale too far in one direction.
    Washington Post, 12 Feb. 2021

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

Last Updated: