50 Public Speaking Quotes to Improve Your Public Speaking Skills

By Norbert Juma
Master quote curator and editor on a mission to inspire

Published January 8, 2023

If you are searching for inspirational public speaking quotes, you have landed at the right place.

Public speaking is a way of communicating information to a live audience.

It can help convey thoughts, views, and ideas effectively and efficiently.

The main purpose of public speaking is to educate, entertain, and inform.

These public speaking quotes are a good source to improve skills related to public speaking.

The quotes can be used to deal with the fear of public speaking.

Not only this, these quotes will muster up your courage and allow you to speak in public.

Many speakers get the motivation to public speaking through these quotes.

Before moving to the quotes section, let’s first discuss ways to improve public speaking skills.

Ways to improve public speaking skills

Below are a few of the most noteworthy ways to improve your public speaking skills.

Planning
Practice
Confidence
Engagement

Planning

Planning is the most important way to improve public speaking skills and deliver a remarkable speech.

Many tools, such as Rhetorical Triangle, can help plan a public speech.

Start your speech with an interesting or powerful opening to create impact.

Start planning a few days before delivering a speech.

Practice

Public speaking is not successful and effective without practice.

As it is said, practice makes perfect, so practicing improves public speaking skills.

Focus on your tone, body language, and confidence while doing practice.

Do a lot of practice before finally delivering your speech in public.

Confidence

A confident mindset is essential for a successful public speech.

Don’t fear, panic, or get nervous in front of the audience.

Confidence helps you to get good body language in front of an audience.

Engagement

Successful public speakers engage the audience during their speeches.

Good public speaking is not one-sided, but the audience also participates.

Don’t speak so fast; take pauses in between so the audience understands what you have said.

Top 10 public speaking quotes

Famous personalities do a lot of public speaking, and they know about it. Following are the top public speaking quotes from well-known people.

1. “Public Speaking is very easy.” — Dan Quayle

2. “I’m shy at public speaking, which is tough.” — Ruth Negga

3. “Sorry, public speaking isn’t really my strong side.” — Naomi Osaka

4. “Good public speaking is based on good private thinking.” — Scott Berkun

5. “Public speaking is the number-one fear… even over death!” — Emily Deschanel

6. “Public speaking is something I fear more than death itself.” — Johann Johannsson

7. “Accustomed as I am to public speaking, I know the futility of it.” — Franklin P. Adams

8. “I want to do public speaking and cause campaigning. I want to write a book.” — Bristol Palin

9. “Public speaking is the art of diluting a two-minute idea with a two-hour vocabulary.” — Evan Esar

10. “I took a public speaking class in college and managed to make the class laugh a little bit.” — Kevin James

Public speaking quotes the skill of public speaking

Public speaking is a great skill. Below are quotes from authors who know the skill of public speaking.

11. “I’ve always loved public speaking, and that’s something I definitely will pursue after the Olympics.” — Lauren Gibbs

12. “Whenever people have trouble public speaking, it’s because they are just thinking about themselves.” — Tony Robbins

13. “With real estate, it’s location, location, location. In public speaking, it’s acoustics, acoustics, acoustics.” — Christopher Buckley

14. “There are certain things in which mediocrity is not to be endured, such as poetry, music, painting, public speaking.” — Jean de la Bruyere

15. “Public speaking professionals say that you win or lose the battle to hold your audience in the first 30 seconds of a given presentation.” — John Medina

16. “My activism has to do with my conscience; I cannot let certain things slide without doing something. My public speaking is part of an art form that is cultural.” — Lee Maracle

17. “Public Speaking is a skill that can be studied, polished, and perfected. Not only can you get good at it, you can get damn good at it and it makes a heck of a difference.” — Tom Peters

18. “It is a point that I repeat over and over again in teaching public speaking. It is not so much what you say as it is the tone and manner in which you say it that makes a lasting impression.” — Napoleon Hill

19. “In public speaking, we must appeal either to the prejudices of others or to the love of truth and justice. If we think merely of displaying our own ability, we shall ruin every cause we undertake.” — William Hazlitt

20. “The smaller trips are useful in between the big trips: they help me gain new skills and experiences, they solve a perpetual case of cabin fever, and they are accommodating to an ambitious public speaking schedule and to some private guiding.” — Andrew Skurka

Public speaking quotes the fear of public speaking

Many people face the fear of public speaking. The following quotes help to counter the fear of public speaking.

21. “Death is the number two fear that people have, and public speaking is the first!” — Sidney Sheldon

22. “Public speaking, for me, or speaking even in front of a handful of people is my greatest fear.” — Bill Clegg

23. “I was extremely shy and had a terrible fear of public speaking. But I had fallen in love with stand-up.” — Kumail Nanjiani

24. “Doing stand-up is not normal. People fear public speaking above all other things, and I am no different.” — Dominic Holland

25. “I used to fear public speaking. My voice would shake, and I used to forget to breathe. Now it’s pretty easy for me.” — Spencer Stone

26. “The fear of public speaking is a primal fear. You can train your body to not be crazy when you’re doing it, but it truly is a primal fear.” — Neal Brennan

27. “Fear paralyses you – fear of flying, fear of the future, fear of leaving a rubbish marriage, fear of public speaking, or whatever it is.” — Annie Lennox

28. “I have a fear of public speaking. It’s very hard work. Words are not my skill, and because they’re not my skill, I have to work doubly hard.” — Kerry Stokes

29. “I had used eclectic therapy and behavior therapy on myself at the age of 19 to get over my fear of public speaking and of approaching young women in public.” — Albert Ellis

30. “Surveys show that the #1 fear of Americans is public speaking. #2 is death. That means that at a funeral, the average American would rather be in the casket than doing the eulogy.” — Jerry Seinfeld

Funny public speaking quotes

Public speaking quotes are funny too. These quotes will spread a smile on your face, and you will enjoy it.

31. “Public speaking? I speak to myself on the street!” — Eliot Spitzer

32. “Some introverts are perfectly comfortable with public speaking; I’m not one of them.” — Susan Cain

33. “It’s been a moment since I’ve done some public speaking. I find nowadays it’s best to keep quiet.” — Drake

34. “I’d rather go on stage and talk or do public speaking than sing. Singing is very scary. It’s very exposing.” — Paisley

35. “People think actresses find public speaking easy, and it’s not easy at all; we’re used to hiding behind masks.” — Jane Fonda

36. “More men feel comfortable doing ‘public speaking,’ while more women feel comfortable doing ‘private speaking.’” — Deborah Tannen

37. “I didn’t go to fancy schools or come from money or from a family that valued law or public speaking in any shape or form.” — Neal Katyal

38. “See, I would never have Beyonce up here public speaking. She’s not good at it. Solange was just at Yale. She’s incredible at it.” — Mathew Knowles

39. “I blush easily. I have difficulty meeting people’s eye, difficulty with public speaking, the normal afflictions of the shy, but not to a paralyzing degree.” — Nicholson Baker

40. “I do a lot of public speaking and presentations and I’ always start with a self-deprecating joke to make everybody feel comfortable with my size because there can be hang-ups and anxieties.” — Warwick Davis

Other motivational public speaking quotes

The quotes below show the experience of authors related to public speaking.

41. “I enjoy my public speaking. That’s what I love doing. It’s what I’m good at.” — Terry Bradshaw

42. “I failed public speaking in grade school, ‘cause I was so nervous and scared.” — Gary Clark, Jr.

43. “It was only after a visit to a learning centre, where they taught me public speaking, that my personality emerged.” — Kubra Sait

44. “I spoke at a number of conventions, like for pharmacists and cosmetologists, so I’ve done a lot of public speaking in my life.” — Caroline Mulroney

45. “In the daytime, I was studying at school, and in the evenings, I was a stage kid. I was trained in theatre and public speaking. I was a really active kid.” — Imran Amed

46. “There was kind of a pivotal moment in my life in junior high school when my English teacher told me I should be a part of the public speaking competition.” — Sarah Rafferty

47. “I think I always enjoyed the energy of a crowd, of being onstage. It started when I was even younger doing public speaking at school and just kept going from there.” — Tom Green

48. “When I was in the sixth form I presented a cable and satellite programme about music, television, and video. I used to do public speaking competitions.” — Konnie Huq

49. “I went to a private school in Manhattan, and at a young age, they made us do public speaking. For some reason, I was good at standing in front of the class and speaking.” — Paul Dano

50. “I’ve been around politics a long time. I’ve seen it at its best and its worst, been at so many events, listened to private conversations versus public speaking, understood the game of it, and in many ways the theatrics.” — Kevin Spacey