fantastic
- Extremely good, impressive, or wonderful.
- Imaginative and hard to believe, like something from a fantasy.
In a sentence
- The team gave a fantastic performance and won the championship by a huge margin.
- The movie told a fantastic tale of dragons and enchanted kingdoms.
Usage note. 'Fantastic' is quite informal when used to mean 'excellent'; in formal or academic writing, choose 'remarkable' or 'extraordinary' instead.
Where it comes from
English fantastic · entered English late 14th c.
From Medieval Latin 'fantasticus' and Greek 'phantastikos,' meaning 'able to present to the mind,' derived from 'phantazein' (to make visible) and 'phantos' (visible). It entered English in the late 14th century with the sense of 'existing only in imagination.' The informal meaning of 'excellent' developed in the 20th century.