Miserable

//ˈmɪz(ə)ɹəbəl// adj, noun, slang

adj, noun, slang ·Very common ·Middle school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A miserable person; a wretch.

    "Dona Carmen repaired to the balcony to chat and jest with, and at, these miserables, who stopped before the door to rest in their progress. All pretended poverty while literally groaning under the weight of their riches."

  2. 2
    A state of misery or melancholy. in-plural, informal, with-definite-article

    "By 3:00 P.M. both DeeDee and Sandra's pants were thoroughly soaked, and this unhappy circumstance gave DeeDee a bad case of the miserables."

Adjective
  1. 1
    In a state of misery: very sad, ill, or poor.

    "Thanks to that penny he had just spent so recklessly [on a newspaper] he would pass a happy hour, taken, for once, out of his anxious, despondent, miserable self. It irritated him shrewdly to know that these moments of respite from carking care would not be shared with his poor wife, with careworn, troubled Ellen."

  2. 2
    Very bad (at something); unskilled, incompetent; hopeless.

    "He's good at some sports, like tennis, but he's just miserable at football."

  3. 3
    Of the weather, extremely unpleasant due to being cold, wet, overcast, etc.
  4. 4
    Wretched; worthless; mean; contemptible.

    "a miserable sinner"

  5. 5
    Causing unhappiness or misery. obsolete

    "For what's more miserable than discontent?"

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  1. 6
    Avaricious; niggardly; miserly. obsolete

    "the liberal-hearted man is by the opinion of the prodigal miserable, and by the judgment of the miserable lavish"

Adjective
  1. 1
    contemptibly small in amount wordnet
  2. 2
    characterized by physical misery wordnet
  3. 3
    of the most contemptible kind wordnet
  4. 4
    deserving or inciting pity wordnet
  5. 5
    very unhappy; full of misery wordnet
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  1. 6
    of very poor quality or condition wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
unhappycontemptibledeplorablewretchedunhappywoeful

Example

More examples

"A miserable sequence of defeats discouraged us."

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French miserable, from Old French, from Latin miserabilis, equivalent to miser + -able.

Related phrases

miserable as a wet hen

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