difficult
adjective
Simple meaning
Not easy to do, understand, or deal with
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
difuhkuhltSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈdɪfəkəlt
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
adjective
Not easy; requiring great physical or mental effort to accomplish or comprehend or endure
Hard, not easy, requiring much effort.
often of a personor a horseetc
Hard to manage, uncooperative, troublesome.
Hard to control
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- A2 · Elementary
- Frequency
- Very Common
- Typical Use
- Everyday English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Not easy; requiring great physical or mental effort to accomplish or comprehend or endure
Used this way, difficult is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly warm, approving pull. It carries more force than its gentler alternatives. It turns up most in personal or emotional discussion and literature or storytelling contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Positive
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Strong
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Warm and admiring
- Usage feel
- Everyday but emotionally strong
Where it naturally appears
- Personal/emotional discussion
- Literature/storytelling
Usage note
Difficult is emotionally heavy: it suggests deep or lasting feeling, not a passing mood, so it can overstate a small reaction.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use difficult
- “Learning a new language can be quite difficult for many people.”adjective
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Relationships
Similar in idea, different in strength, tone or register.
Stronger
- gruelling , Punishingly hard.
Softer
- challenging , Hard in a positive, motivating way.
More formal
- arduous , Formal: long and demanding.
More casual
- tricky , Informal: awkward rather than hard.
Opposite
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- difficultynoun
- achieveverb
- impossibleadjective
- understandverb
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.