Hopeless

//ˈhəʊplɪs// adj

adj ·Common ·High school level

Definitions

Adjective
  1. 1
    Without hope; despairing; not expecting anything positive.

    "I am a woman, friendless, hopeless."

  2. 2
    Giving no ground of hope; promising nothing desirable; desperate.

    "a hopeless cause"

  3. 3
    Without talent, not skilled.

    "He's a hopeless writer, but can draw very well."

  4. 4
    Incurable.

    "She is a hopeless romantic."

Adjective
  1. 1
    (informal to emphasize how bad it is) beyond hope of management or reform wordnet
  2. 2
    without hope because there seems to be no possibility of comfort or success wordnet
  3. 3
    certain to fail wordnet
  4. 4
    of a person unable to do something skillfully wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
unhopefulbadbleakdespairingdesperatedespondent

Example

More examples

"I'm hopeless at ironing so I buy permanent press clothes."

Etymology

From hope + -less, compare Swedish hopplös.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.