Definition of banal in English:

adjective

• So lacking in originality as to be obvious and boring.

  ‘songs with banal, repeated words’

  More example sentences

  • ‘A song which can appeal to non-native speakers is obviously going to have relatively banal lyrics.’
  • ‘It doesn't really say anything new and tells its story in the most banal and predictable manner possible.’
  • ‘The play pokes fun at these dialogues through characters having banal conversations.’
  • ‘Her comments are so threadbare and banal, that her role smacks of the worst kind of tokenism.’
  • ‘The outcome of this populist turn is the celebration of the ordinary and the banal.’
  • ‘As long as domesticated TV reigns supreme, our fascination with the banal will surely continue.’
  • ‘Ray's comments swerved from the banal, to the solid and sober, like all good reporters.’
  • ‘She loathes Hollywood, finds it distasteful and banal, hates the idea of her art being tainted by commerce.’
  • ‘I suspect that he thinks he is one, which is why we are occasionally treated to comments that to most people appear banal.’
  • ‘The banal and obvious truth is that life and a country are largely what you make of them.’
  • ‘So expertly dissected that it's like all great satire - banal in its accuracy and attention to detail.’
  • ‘I find most New Age spiritual music to be boring and banal but I've met a lot of people that find great use for it.’
  • ‘I made a long list of quite banal and boring questions that I went through and asked this man.’
  • ‘This outcome has become a banal tautology repeated in every pharmaceutical marketing article.’
  • ‘No one can get excited about the most boring and banal of road stops like this guy.’
  • ‘The real opposite of the sublime is, of course, the intransigently banal and commonsensical.’
  • ‘While some of the book's guidelines are common sense, others are banal.’
  • ‘What followed was flagrant musical bankruptcy and the insufferable drone of banal music.’
  • ‘The album avoids being banal and predictable because he is not afraid to fully use his voice to emote.’
  • ‘People are always trotting out banal statistics and clichés to placate those who appear to be in a spot of bother.’

  Synonyms

  trite, hackneyed, clichéd, platitudinous, vapid, commonplace, ordinary, common, stock, conventional, stereotyped, predictable, overused, overdone, overworked, stale, worn out, time-worn, tired, threadbare, hoary, hack, unimaginative, unoriginal, derivative, uninspired, prosaic, dull, boring, pedestrian, run-of-the-mill, routine, humdrum

  View synonyms