unprincipled
adjective
Simple meaning
Lacking principles or moral scruples.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
uhnprinsuhpuhldSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ənpˈɹɪnsəpəld
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
Lacking principles or moral scruples
“Freedom from coarse unprincipled calumny"- A.E.Stevenson.”
Lacking moral values.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
This meaning: Lacking principles or moral scruples
Used this way, unprincipled is a common word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in ethics or values contexts.
“Freedom from coarse unprincipled calumny"- A.E.Stevenson.”
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Common
- Connotation
- No strong connotation
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Ethics/values
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
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More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: lacking principles or moral scruples
Antonyms
Sense: lacking principles or moral scruples
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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.