The government's response to the protests was considered a bit heavy-handed.
Source: tatoeba (9127248)
Heavy-handed
Synonyms for "heavy-handed" (88 found)
Ranked by relevance and common usage.
Closest matches (18)
Strong matches (26)
Related words (44)
Related word relations
OpenGloss and ConceptNet supply richer edges like generalizations, collocations, and derivations.
Related terms
2 entriesderived
2 entriessimilar
2 entriesTranslations
52 translations across 8 languages.
Bulgarian
4 entries- драстичен adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- жесток adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- непохватен adj (clumsy, awkward)
- несръчен adj (clumsy, awkward)
Dutch
2 entries- hardhandig adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- te scheutig adj (excessive, overdone)
Finnish
4 entries- karkea adj (lacking subtlety or nuance)
- kovakourainen adj (clumsy, awkward)
- kovakourainen adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- kovaotteinen adj (overbearing; pushy and coercive)
French
2 entries- excessif adj (excessive, overdone)
- maladroit adj (clumsy, awkward)
Galician
1 entries- excesivo adj (excessive, overdone)
German
4 entries- drakonisch adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- drastisch adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- durchgreifend adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- einschneidend adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
Russian
4 entries- деспо́тичный adj (overbearing; pushy and coercive)
- деспоти́ческий adj (overbearing; pushy and coercive)
- жесто́кий adj (overbearing; pushy and coercive)
- кривору́кий adj (clumsy, awkward)
Spanish
3 entries- draconiano adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- drástico adj (extreme, unnecessarily forceful)
- excesivo adj (excessive, overdone)
Sample sentences
12 total sentences available.
Tear gas, rubber bullets, and live ammunition have been used against protesters, in what he described as "heavy-handed suppression."
Source: tatoeba (11255853)
The virus “has thrived because poverty, inequality, discrimination, the destruction of our natural environment and other human rights failures have created enormous fragilities in our societies,” Guterres said, while simultaneously providing leaders with a pretext to impose “heavy-handed security responses and repressive measures that curtail civic space and media freedom.”
Source: tatoeba (11497352)
They fear the balance of power between the state and individuals has been upended and bewail governments navigating the pandemic with what they argue has been heavy-handed state coercion.
Source: tatoeba (12085346)
Showing 4 of 12 available sentences.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.