misery
noun
Simple meaning
A feeling of intense unhappiness.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
mizereeSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈmɪzɚi
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.
noun
A feeling of intense unhappiness
“She was exhausted by her misery and grief.”
Great unhappiness; extreme pain of body or mind; wretchedness; distress; woe.
Cause of misery; calamity; misfortune.
US and UKdialects
A bodily ache or pain.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Formality
- Technical
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A feeling of intense unhappiness
Used this way, misery is a common word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It carries more force than its gentler alternatives. It turns up most in personal or emotional discussion and literature or storytelling contexts.
“She was exhausted by her misery and grief.”
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Strong
- How common
- Common
- Connotation
- Strongly negative / painful
- Usage feel
- Everyday but emotionally strong
Where it naturally appears
- Personal/emotional discussion
- Literature/storytelling
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use misery
- “She was exhausted by her misery and grief.”noun
- “The misery and wretchedness of those slums is intolerable.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
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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.