put lipstick on a pig
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
To make something unattractive appear more appealing
Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt
làm cho điều gì đó không hấp dẫn trở nên thu hút hơn
Machine-translated — suggest a fix
Literally: applying lipstick to a pig
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
The new marketing campaign is just putting lipstick on a pig, the product is still low quality
AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)
Sources & notes
Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “put lipstick on a pig” mean?
To make something unattractive appear more appealing Literally: applying lipstick to a pig
Is “put lipstick on a pig” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.