Earnest
adj, name, noun, verb ·Common ·Middle school level
Definitions
- 1 Gravity; serious purpose; earnestness. uncountable
"Take heed that this jest do not one day turn to earnest."
- 2 A sum of money paid in advance as a deposit; hence, a pledge, a guarantee, an indication of something to come.
"Now he that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit."
- 3 something of value given by one person to another to bind a contract wordnet
- 4 Seriousness; reality; actuality (as opposed to joking or pretence) uncountable
- 1 To be serious with; use in earnest. transitive
"Let's prove among ourselves our armes in jest, That when we come to earnest them with men, We may them better use."
- 2 second-person singular simple present indicative of earn archaic, form-of, indicative, present, second-person, singular
- 1 Serious, sincere, ingenuous.
- 2 Focused in the pursuit of an objective; honestly eager to obtain or do.
"earnest prayers"
- 3 Intent; focused; showing a lot of concentration.
"earnest attention"
- 4 Possessing or characterised by seriousness.
"an earnest disposition"
- 5 Strenuous; diligent.
"earnest efforts"
Show 1 more definition
- 6 Serious; weighty; of a serious, weighty, or important nature; important.
- 1 not distracted by anything unrelated to the goal wordnet
- 2 characterized by a firm and humorless belief in the validity of your opinions wordnet
- 3 sincerely earnest wordnet
- 1 A male given name from the Germanic languages, of occasional usage, variant of Ernest.
Antonyms
All antonymsExample
More examples"The rain is coming down in earnest."
Etymology
From Middle English ernest, eornest, from Old English eornest, eornost, eornust (“earnestness, zeal, seriousness, battle”), from Proto-Germanic *ernustuz (“earnest, strength, solidity, struggle, fight”), a derivative of Proto-Germanic *arniz (“efficient, capable, diligent, sure”), from Proto-Indo-European *er- (“to cause to move, arouse, increase”). Cognate with West Frisian earnst (“earnest, seriousness”), Dutch ernst (“seriousness, gravity, earnest”), German Ernst (“seriousness, earnestness, zeal, vigour”), Icelandic ern (“brisk, vigorous”), Gothic 𐌰𐍂𐌽𐌹𐌱𐌰 (arniba, “secure, certain, sure”). The adjective is from Middle English eornest, from Old English eornoste (“earnest, zealous, serious”), from the noun. Cognate with North Frisian ernste (“earnest”), Middle Low German ernest, ernst (“serious, earnest”), German ernst (“serious, earnest”).
Uncertain; apparently related to erres. Compare also arles.
From earn + -est.
Related phrases
More for "earnest"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.