awful
∞
1.0
- adjective
- /ˈɔːfəl/
:
horrible
- The food at the restaurant was truly awful and left a bad taste in my mouth.
- feel awful
- just awful
- pretty awful
It feels like some awful love child of both.
- It feels like some awful love child of both.
- God, that smell was awful, said the skunk.
- I don't want to be like these awful, savage places.
- It was one of the most awful things to edit ever.
- She's talking about how awful his family is.
- but an unhappy narrative that tells them how awful my life is
- And they come up in weird, awful places as well.
- And the Chinese once again, awful, awful impersonation.
- And it was just awful, horrendous, terrible.
- Helplessness is one of the most awful feelings in the world.
- And that's a really awful way to fight a war.
- This is just, like a really awful situation.
- And I'll tell you a bit more about how awful it is next time.
- And I was serving some awful customers that were really bossy.
- And it was an awful, awful day.
Examples
-
He couldn't believe how awful the weather was on their vacation, ruining their plans.
-
After watching that movie, I felt awful because the story was so depressing.
-
This one looks awful though, like it looks wrong.
-
We have this awful thing up here.
-
And I think that we just lose an awful lot by that view.
-
This is going to be awful already.
-
You really have done an awful lot for us.
-
Why must you go to that awful place?
-
Your face has turned an awful shade of red.
-
There was a long spell of quiet, awful quiet, before the babies showed up everywhere again.
Academic text (1997)
Synonyms
∞
1.0
Very bad or unpleasant and often serious
∞
1.5
Very bad or frightening in a way that makes you feel upset
562
4.1
Very bad or mean and not liked by people
531
1.3
Causing a strong feeling of dislike or making you feel sick
457
1.8
Words or actions that hurt people
280
2.3
Very unpleasant and making you feel sick or disgusted
215
1.0
Not nice and causing discomfort or unhappiness
157
5.0
Very bad and morally wrong
136
3.7
Very bad and unpleasant, often causing fear or shock
126
5.1
Very unpleasant in a way that makes people angry or upset
87
5.6
Causing shock and strong disgust because it is very bad
82
7.0
Very shocking and scary, causing fear or disgust
58
7.2
Too terrible to describe in words
52
4.1
A very unpleasant thing that shocks or disgusts you
24
7.2
Very bad or morally wrong so people strongly dislike it
23
9.3
Very bad or disappointing to experience
23
7.7
Causing strong dislike or disgust because people see it as morally wrong
20
7.7
Causing strong disgust or hatred in people
20
8.2
Very unpleasant and likely to make people feel strong dislike
19
7.0
Being very bad and of low quality
16
8.4
Very bad and unpleasant
7
4.2
Very bad or unpleasant in a strong way
4
8.2
Very bad and unpleasant, of poor quality
1
8.4
Very bad and disappointing to experience
Causing a strong feeling of dislike or making people feel sick
Antonyms
How Bad
Surface Forms
Morphology
Etymology
Awful originally meant 'full of awe', but over time people started using it for things that are 'very bad' or unpleasant. A helpful way to remember this change is to think that strong shock or dislike replaced the old sense of wonder.