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If you feel like “a hot air balloon that could go to space” or, perhaps, “like a room without a roof,” you might—with all due respect to Pharrell Williams—be not just happy but ecstatic. In other words: euphoric, over the moon, positively brimming with joy or excitement. Ecstatic has been used in English since the late 1500s, arriving (via Medieval Latin) from the Greek adjective ekstatikós meaning, among other things “out of one’s senses.” Ekstatikós, in turn, was formed in part from eksta-, the stem of such verbs as existánai, “to displace or confound,” and exístasthai “to be astonished or lose consciousness.” That seems an appropriate history for a word that can describe someone who is nearly out of their mind with intense emotion. Eksta-, it should be noted, also contributed to the Greek noun ékstasis, meaning “astonishment” or “trance,” which led to ecstasy (the English word, of course, not the universal feeling).
Synonyms of ecstatic
Examples of ecstatic in a Sentence
Barbara Ehrenreich, Civilization, June/July 2000
… in dietary terms we are veritable troglodytes (which, speaking personally, is all right by me). I think this explains a lot, not least my expanding sense of dismay as the waiter bombarded us with ecstatic descriptions of roulades, ratatouilles, empanadas, langostinos … and goodness knows what else.
—Bill Bryson, I'm a Stranger Here Myself, 1999
He was ecstatic when he heard that he was going to be a father.
a football player who was ecstatic upon receiving a full athletic scholarship to the college of his choice
Zac Ntim, Deadline, 29 Apr. 2026
That rich compositional energy emerges even now in beloved memes of goofy, ecstatic love and in the work of songwriters like Olivia Dean, Muni Long and Victoria Monét.
—New York Times, 28 Apr. 2026
Douglas, for one, was ecstatic about the opportunity to reunite with his former teammate.
—Miami Herald, 25 Apr. 2026
Practitioners can find more than 180 classes per week at The Yoga Barn, an epicenter of yin, vinyasa, Hatha, and kundalini, plus meditation, sound healing, and ecstatic dance.
—Kathryn Romeyn, Travel + Leisure, 24 Apr. 2026
See All Example Sentences for ecstatic
Cite this Entry
“Ecstatic.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ecstatic. Accessed 1 May. 2026.
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