Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To make a hissing or sputtering sound.
- v. Informal To fail or end weakly, especially after a hopeful beginning.
- n. Informal A failure; a fiasco.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To make a hissing sound; hiss or sputter, as a liquid or gas forced out of a narrow aperture, or a liquid discharging gas, or a wet combustible, as wood or gunpowder, burning: usually with special reference to the weakness and sudden diminution or cessation of such sound.
- Hence To stop abruptly after a more or less brilliant start; come to a sudden and lame conclusion; fail ignominiously; specifically, in school and college slang, to fail in a recitation or an examination: often with out: as, the undertaking promised well, but it soon fizzled out; nearly the whole class fizzled in calculus.
- To break wind.
- In school and college slang, to examine (a student) with the result of failure on his part: as, the professor fizzled nearly the whole class.
- n. Same as fizz, 2.
- n. A fizzling or fizzing condition; hence, a state of restless agitation; a stew; worry: as, he is in a fizzle about his luggage.
- n. A breaking wind.
- n. A failure or an abortive effort; in particular, in school and college slang, a failure in a recitation or an examination.
Wiktionary
- v. To sputter or hiss.
- v. figuratively To decay or die off to nothing; to burn out; to end less successfully than previously hoped.
- n. A spluttering or hissing sound.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To make a hissing sound.
- v. Colloq. or Low To make a ridiculous failure in an undertaking, especially after a good start; to achieve nothing.
- n. colloq. A failure or abortive effort; a fiasco.
WordNet 3.0
- v. end weakly
- n. a complete failure
- n. a fricative sound (especially as an expression of disapproval)
Etymologies
- Attested in English since 1525-35. From earlier fysel ("to fart"). Related to fīsa ("to fart"). Compare with fisa ("to fart (silently)"). See also feist. (Wiktionary)
- Probably from obsolete fise, a breaking wind, from Middle English, of Scandinavian origin; akin to Old Norse fīsa, to break wind. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The current market fizzle is an epiphenomenon this time around.”
“It is possible that the explosive yield was so low because North Korea made a mistake in their design or construction (a so-called "fizzle" -- though one that would still excavate a hundred-meter crater in a major city), or it is possible that they were intentionally trying to build a low-mass weapon that they could put on top of a missile.”
Christopher Chyba: Is There a Kind of Multipolar Security Spiral Now Taking Place in Northeast Asia?
“In nuclear parlance, a test is described as a fizzle when it fails to meet the desired yield.”
“A test is described as a fizzle when it fails to meet the desired yield.”
“I can't wait for that "perfect storm" phrase fizzle out like a fart in the wind.”
“Though the country seems to have corrected the mistakes that led to the failure of its October 2006 test (a "fizzle" that exploded at about 1 kiloton, far lower than the intended yield), all available evidence indicates that North Korea is still years away from a deliverable nuclear weapon.”
“Does this reform movement just kind of fizzle out?”
“To get over the embarrassment of the "fizzle," Kim's technicians had to detonate another device to validate their designs and demonstrate the power of their weapon.”
“Not to mention shipping delays and relaunches that kind of fizzle out when they should spark.”
“To borrow from Bill, it'll be Obama who will "fizzle" by September, and Gore will toss his hat into the ring and enlist the junior Senator from Illinois as his running mate.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘fizzle’.
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Sounds
words that describe sound
atchoo, atishoo, babble, bam, bay, beep, blast, blather, bleat, bleep, blip, bong and 242 more...
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EN-HU - important words for a HU inte...
Words only (I left out the expressions) from Geza Kerenyi's EN-HU interpreters' dictionary. Most of them pose some difficulty when interpreted between HU and EN in either or both directions.
abalone, abrasive, abstractionist, abstruse, abysmal, academia, accessibility, accessible, acclimate, accolade, accompanist, achiever and 1469 more...
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The Storybook Words
Words from children's literature that feed young imaginations and spark a love of words and language.
peril, sparkle, fizzle, kerfuffle, lachrymose, heebie-jeebies, turtleneck, peacoat, smarmy, daffodil, snapdragon, grouch and 1 more...
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That Could Have Gone Better
dud, flop, fiasco, debacle, failure, learning experience, wash, doa, epic fail, bomb, crash and burn, bungle and 41 more...
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onomatopoeias (2 syllable)
2 syllable words that mean what they sound like. (dictionaried or un-dictionaried | onomatopoeic in nature)
onomatopoeias (1 syllable) | onomatopoeias (3+ syllables)
( op...wobble, sputter, spatter, flutter, giggle, hiccup, mumble, murmur, jangle, rattle, sizzle, rustle and 21 more...
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gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1904 more...
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Funny Words
gerbil, spleen, regurgitate, crevis, retro, orangutan, jiggly, ear, tart, pickle, fizzle, kapow and 4 more...
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Fun Words
Words that are fun to say....
gobbledygook, jings, crivens, hullabaloo, wheech, brouhaha, pizzazz, harum-scarum, namby-pamby, pussyfoot, frippery, pitter-patter and 333 more...
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Autantonyms
Words with mutually exclusive double meanings. Also, here are some:
QUASI-AUTANTONYMS: slow up/slow down; bar/debar; bone/debone; burn up/burn down; fat chance/slim chance; fill in/fil...clip, cleave, sanction, handicap, fast, jibe, secrete, aloha, bimonthly, bolt, cheerio, commencement and 139 more...
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My Revised GRE Preparation List
Words from the new GRE : This list consists mostly of words from the book Magoosh-GRE-vocab-ebook, which is one of the best vocab materials available, especially if you have started preparing one ...
mulct, dupe, pittance, stipend, defray, cupidity, avarice, prodigal, profligate, affluent, insolvent, penurious and 533 more...
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Reading Reading
Words from the works of Peter Reading - at least one from each (except the Schwitters-esque erosions, cut-ups etc).
overbright, pimpled, muskiness, effuse, stoup, maul, unlevel, viscid, perfidious, glibly, aloes, drouth and 449 more...
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My GRE
concomitant, mendacity, corollary, mandate, ascertain, exacerbate, substantiate, perennial, exemplify, hegemony, acrimonious, repertoire and 653 more...
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sionnach's Words
contumely, fomite, holmgang, poltroon, eleemosynary, obsidian, nugatory, grindcore, felch, recrudescent, pyx, parenteral and 3271 more...
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geekwad's Words
mysterium, elif, reckon, shadowy, ostensibly, unique, foodie, surreptitiously, asynchronous, insane, berserk, space pirate and 235 more...
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favorite words
ennui, bonhomie, eschew, liaison, serendipity, lovely, dusk, kitten, epitome, sexy, beloved, darling and 396 more...
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EN - funny (single) words
"Fornication" is not equal to "formication".
Words with funny meaning, spelling or both.barratry, bastinado, bezonian, bibcock, bibliobibuli, biffy, bodewash, boeotian, boondoggle, borborygmic, bosky, brobdingnagian and 729 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for fizzle.

yarb Outside your cottage we watched a star
fizzle and set in a mole fur sky.
- Peter Reading, New Year Letter, from For the Municipality's Elderly, 1974 Jun 22, 2008
oroboros Contronymic in the sense: effervescence vs. decline. Jan 27, 2007