Nefarious
//nɪˈfɛəɹi.əs// adj
adj ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
Adjective
- 1 Sinful, villainous, criminal, or wicked, especially when noteworthy or notorious for such characteristics.
"Aliens have a nefarious connotation in many science fiction books."
Adjective
- 1 extremely wicked wordnet
Example
More examples"There's nothing nefarious going on here."
Etymology
From Latin nefārius (“execrable, abominable”), from nefās (“something contrary to divine law, an impious deed, sin, crime”), from ne- (“not”) + fās (“the dictates of religion, divine law”), which is related to Latin for (“I speak, I say”) and cognate to Ancient Greek φημί (phēmí, “I say”).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.