dreadful
adjective · adverb · noun
Simple meaning
Genuinely horrific, awful.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
drehdfuhlSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈdɹɛdfəl
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
Genuinely horrific, awful, or alarming; dangerous, risky.
hyperbolic
Unpleasant, awful, very bad (also used as an intensifier).
Full of something causing dread, whether
Scared, afraid, frightened.
Timid, easily frightened.
Reverential, full of pious awe.
adverb
informal
Dreadfully.
noun
A shocker: a report of a crime written in a provokingly lurid style.
A shocking or sensational crime.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Genuinely horrific, awful, or alarming; dangerous, risky.
In this sense, dreadful is a very strong, expressive word and reaches for fear at its strongest, so mild worry is well below it.
- Emotional tone
- Strongly negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Very strong
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Strongly negative / painful
- Usage feel
- Everyday but emotionally strong
Where it naturally appears
- Personal/emotional discussion
- Literature/storytelling
Usage note
Dreadful 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.
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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.