Other forms: bragging, bragged, brags
To brag is to boast in an especially irritating way. Brag about it, stop bragging, nothing to brag about.
It is stronger and less forgivable than boast, and it always implies the listener has had enough. The preposition is about. As a noun, a brag is the boast itself. Note bragging rights, meaning the entitlement to mention a win for years afterwards, which is used cheerfully; and brag as the name of an old English card game that gave poker some of its shape.
1verbbragTo boast in an irritating way.
“He's always bragging about how much money he earns.”
brag is a boasting.
Middle English braggen meant to make a loud noise, and the boasting sense came from the volume. It is probably related to an Old Norse word meaning foremost or best, which fits the content as well as the noise.
Old Norse
bragr — best; foremost; poetry
Middle English
braggen — to make a loud noise; to speak boastfully
English, today
brag
Built from
From Middle English braggen (“to make a loud noise; to speak boastfully”) of origin. Possibly related to the Middle English - adjective brag (“prideful; spirited”), which is probably of cel - origin; or from Old Norse bragr (“best; foremost; poetry”); or through Old English - from Old Norse braka (“to creak”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA