SYNONYMS AND RELATED EXPRESSIONS
opportunist
noun
Someone who uses circumstances for personal advantage, often setting principles aside.
Local English device voice, when available. This is not a recorded dictionary pronunciation.
Person seeking advantage
Closest synonyms
Related words and expressions
These extend or explain the idea and may require a different sentence structure.
Usage distinction
Return to topOpportunist usually criticizes putting advantage ahead of principle; taking a useful opportunity is not automatically opportunism.
CHECK THE MEANING IN CONTEXT
See opportunist in use
The story's opportunist changes loyalties whenever a better offer appears.
At a networking evening, a guest used fawning praise whenever a successful designer approached, calling every unfinished sketch brilliant before looking at it. Another visitor acted as a hanger-on, staying beside the best-connected members mainly to receive invitations to private events. A third appeared to be an opportunist: he abandoned his stated objection to unpaid work as soon as accepting it might bring him influential contacts.
Compare an alternative with the original word in each passage. Shared meanings do not make every pair interchangeable.
Synonym reference scope and sources
The groups distinguish the senses selected for this study entry. Closest synonyms and broader related expressions have separate labels. The listed sources support lexical selection; not every phrase is a direct quotation from a source.
How the synonym reference was prepared / WordNet 3.0 license