damnedest

damnedest is the superlative form of damned.

damnedest is the second-person singular simple past indicative of damn.

Meaning of damned

damned (comparative damneder or damnder or more damned, superlative damnedest or damndest or most damned)

Godforsaken.
- You're children of the damned // like candles, watch them burn // burning in the light // you'll burn again tonight.1982, Iron Maiden, “Children of the Damned”
Synonyms:

accursed, fey, ever-damned, reprobate, condemned, cursed, star-crossed, sunk, cussed, dead meat

damn (third-person singular simple present damns, present participle damning, simple past and past participle damned)

(intransitive, transitive) To condemn.
- The official position is that anyone who does this will be damned for all eternity.
To condemn; to declare guilty; to doom; to adjudge to punishment.
- He shall not live; look, with a spot I damn him.1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
Synonyms:

convict, doom
To put out of favor; to ruin; to label negatively.
- I’m afraid that if I speak out on this, I’ll be damned as a troublemaker.
To condemn as unfit, harmful, invalid, immoral or illegal.
- You are not so arrant a critic as to damn them [the works of modern poets] […] without hearing.1708 November 8, Alexander Pope, letter to Henry Cromwell
Synonyms:

anathematize, demonize, excoriate, vilify
(slang, slightly vulgar) To curse; put a curse upon.
- That man stole my wallet. Damn him!
Synonyms:

comminate, execrate, imprecate
(archaic) To invoke damnation; to curse.
- […] while I inwardly damn.c. 1767-1774, Oliver Goldsmith, letter to Mrs. Bunbury
Synonyms:

ban, execrate, point the bone

damnedest (uncountable)

One's best effort.
- "Fancy was doing her damnedest to pull her own oar and the boys were tripping all over themselves to treat her like a lady."1991, Cathy Cash Spellman, Paint the Wind, page 148

alternative form	damndest

From damned + -est.

What does damnedest mean?: Damnedest means one's best effort.
What is damnedest the superlative form of?: Damnedest is the superlative form of damned.
What part of speech is damnedest?: Damnedest is a noun.

Adapted from Wiktionary: damnedest (page history and authors); damned (page history and authors); damn (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Cite this entry: “damnedest.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/damnedest. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.