Amiss
adj, adv, noun
adj, adv, noun ·2 syllables ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 Fault; wrong; an evil act, a bad deed. obsolete
"Now by my head (said Guyon) much I muse, / How that same knight should do so foule amis[…]."
Adjective
- 1 Wrong; faulty; out of order; improper or otherwise incorrect. predicative
"He suspected something was amiss."
Adjective
- 1 not functioning properly wordnet
Adverb
- 1 Wrongly; mistakenly archaic, not-comparable
"The fire seven times tried this: Seven times tried that judgement is, That did never choose amiss. Some there be that shadows kiss: Such have but a shadow's bliss. There be fools alive, I wis, Silver'd o'er; and so was this. I will ever be your head: So be gone: you are sped."
- 2 Astray. not-comparable
- 3 Imperfectly. not-comparable
Adverb
- 1 in an imperfect or faulty way wordnet
- 2 in an improper or mistaken or unfortunate manner wordnet
- 3 away from the correct or expected course wordnet
Example
More examples"Don't take it amiss if I criticize your work."
Etymology
From a- + miss.
Related phrases
More for "amiss"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.