dead

/dɛd/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Northumbria/diːd/

dead adjective: no longer living; deceased. (Also used as a noun.). Also the clipping of deadlift.

Image: Kulmalukko, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Adjective

dead (not generally comparable, comparative deader, superlative deadest)

(not comparable, usually) No longer living; deceased. (Also used as a noun.)
- All of my grandparents are dead.
- Have respect for the dead.
(not comparable, usually) Devoid of living things; barren.
- a dead planet
- Behold the substance from which all things draw their energy, the bright Spirit of the Globe, without which it cannot live, but must grow cold and dead as the dead moon.1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC
(excessive, not comparable, usually) Figuratively, not alive; lacking life.
- When a man's verses cannot be understood, nor a man's good wit seconded with the forward child, understanding, it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a little room.1600, William Shakespeare, As You Like It, act III, scene 3
(not comparable, usually) Utterly exhausted.
- “Finished the last one at three this morning, apart from bits and bobs and poppers. Quite frankly, I'm dead!”1970, Richard Carpenter, Catweazle, Harmondsworth: Puffin Books, page 124
(not comparable, usually) So hated or offensive as to be absolutely shunned, ignored, or ostracized.
- He is dead to me.
- I didn't have it in myself to go with grace
  And you're the hero flying around, saving face
  And if I'm dead to you, why are you at the wake?2020 July 24, Taylor Swift, “My Tears Ricochet”, in Folklore
(not comparable, usually, literal or hyperbolic) Doomed; marked for death; as good as dead.
- "You come back here this instant! Oh, you're dead, mister!"
- You're dead. A million and one thoughts pounded her at once. But one overpowered all the others. This time you're dead.2009, Noel Hynd, Midnight in Madrid
(not comparable, usually) Without emotion; impassive.
- She stood with dead face and limp arms, unresponsive to my plea.
(not comparable, usually) Stationary; static; immobile or immovable.
- the dead load on the floor
- a dead lift
(not comparable, usually) Without interest to one of the senses; dull; flat.
- dead air
- a dead glass of soda.
(not comparable, usually) Unproductive; fallow.
- dead time
- dead fields
(not comparable, usually) Past, bygone, vanished.
- Then shall the Times that were be Times no more; and it may be that the old, dead days shall return from beyond the Rim, and we who have wept for them shall see those days again, as one who, returning from long travel to his home, comes suddenly on dear, remembered things.1905, Lord Dunsany [i.e., Edward Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany], The Gods of Pegāna, London: [Charles] Elkin Mathews, […], →OCLC, page 40
(not comparable, usually) Lacking usual activity; unexpectedly quiet or empty of people.
- For a Friday night, it's really dead in this restaurant.
Antonyms:

alive, bustling, busy, crowded, hopping, lively, noisy

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(not comparable, usually, device, or electrical circuit) Completely inactive; currently without power; without a signal; not live.
- OK, the circuit's dead. Go ahead and cut the wire.
- Now that the motor's dead you can reach in and extract the spark plugs.
(not comparable, usually) Unable to emit power, being discharged (flat) or faulty.
(not comparable, usually) Broken or inoperable.
- That monitor is dead; don’t bother hooking it up.
(not comparable, usually) No longer used or required.
- There are several dead laws still on the books regulating where horses may be hitched.
- Is this beer glass dead?
(not comparable, usually) Intentionally designed so as not to impart motion or power.
- the dead spindle of a lathe
- A dead axle, also called a lazy axle, is not part of the drivetrain, but is instead free-rotating.
(not comparable, usually) Not in play.
- Once the ball crosses the foul line, it's dead.
(not comparable, usually) Lying so near the hole that the player is certain to hole it in the next stroke.
(not comparable, slang, usually) Tagged out.
(not comparable, usually) Full and complete (usually applied to nouns involving lack of motion, sound, activity, or other signs of life).
- dead stop
- dead sleep
(not comparable, usually) Exact; on the dot.
- dead center
- dead aim
(not comparable, usually) Experiencing pins and needles (paresthesia).
- After sitting on my hands for a while, my arms became dead.
(Internet, excessive, not comparable, often, sometimes, usually) Dying of laughter.
- Lmao I’m dead this was me to my fiancé since I found out in the car and my son was in the back seat 😭2023 March 3, ihatethis6666666, “I am dead ☠️”, in Reddit, r/vanderpumprules
Synonyms:

RIP, crying, LMAO, ROFL
(Internet, not comparable, often, sometimes, usually) Expresses shock, second-hand embarrassment, etc.

Synonyms:

RIP
(not comparable, usually, acoustics) Constructed so as not to reflect or transmit sound; soundless; anechoic.
- a dead floor
(not comparable, obsolete, usually) Bringing death; deadly.
- You breathe these dead news in as dead an ear.c. 1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Iohn”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
(not comparable, usually) Cut off from the rights of a citizen; deprived of the power of enjoying the rights of property.
- A person who is banished or who becomes a monk is civilly dead.
(especially, not comparable, often, rare, usually) Indifferent to; having no obligation toward; no longer subject to or ruled by (sin, guilt, pleasure, etc).
- He was dead to the law. Whatever account others might make of it, yet, for his part, he was dead to it. […] But though he was thus dead to the law, yet he […] was far from thinking himself discharged from his duty to God' on the contrary, he was dead to the law, that he might live unto God.1839, William Jenks, The Comprehensive Commentary on the Holy Bible: Acts-Revelation, page 361
- But he died to the guilt of sin—to the guilt of his people's sins which he had taken upon him; and they, dying with him, as is above declared, die to sin precisely in the same sense in which he died to it. […] He was not justified from it till his resurrection, but from that moment he was dead to...1849, Robert Haldane, Exposition of the Epistle to the Romans, page 255
(not comparable, usually) Of a syllable in languages such as Thai and Burmese: ending abruptly.
- […] syllable is dead, the tone will depend on whether the vowel is short or long.2011, Russ Crowley, Learning Thai, Your Great Adventure, page 28
Antonyms:

live

Adverb

dead (not comparable)

(colloquial, informal, degree) Exactly.
- dead right; dead level; dead flat; dead straight; dead left
- He hit the target dead in the centre.
(colloquial, informal, degree) Very, absolutely, extremely.
- dead wrong; dead set; dead serious; dead drunk; dead broke; dead earnest; dead certain; dead slow; dead sure; dead simple; dead honest; dead accurate; dead easy
- I knew once a Scotch sailmaker who was certain, dead sure, there were people in Mars.1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], →OCLC, part I, page 216
Suddenly and completely.
- He stopped dead.
- She cut me dead again at the last party.
(informal) As if dead.
- dead tired; dead quiet; dead asleep; dead pale; dead cold; dead still
- I was tired of reading, and dead sleepy.1849 May – 1850 November, Charles Dickens, chapter 2, in The Personal History of David Copperfield, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1850, →OCLC

Noun (1)

dead (uncountable)

(often, with-definite-article) Time when coldness, darkness, or stillness is most intense.
- Near-synonym: nadir
- the dead of night
Synonyms:

nadir

Noun (2)

dead pl (plural only)

(plural, plural-only, with-definite-article) Those who have died: dead people.
- the quick and the dead
- Will the dead rise again?
Synonyms:

deceased, departed

Antonyms:

living, quick

Noun (3)

dead (plural deads)

(UK) (usually in the plural) Sterile mining waste, often present as many large rocks stacked inside the workings.

Verb

dead (third-person singular simple present deads, present participle deading, simple past and past participle deaded)

(transitive) To prevent by disabling; to stop.
- “What a man should do, when finds his natural impotency dead him in spiritual works”1826, The Whole Works of the Right Rev. Edward Reynolds, Lord Bishop of Norwich, collected by Edward Reynolds, Benedict Riveley, and Alexander Chalmers. pp. 227. London: B. Holdsworth.
(transitive) To make dead; to deaden; to deprive of life, force, or vigour.
- Heaven's stern decree, / With many an ill, hath numb'd and deaded me.1614–1615, Homer, “(please specify the book number)”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., Homer’s Odysses. […], London: […] Rich[ard] Field [and William Jaggard], for Nathaniell Butter, published 1615...
(UK, US, slang, transitive) To kill.
- I shoulda deaded it from genesis instead of hittin' the Guinnesses2004, “Guinnesses”, in Mm..Food, performed by MF Doom ft. Angelika & 4-IZE
- This dude at the club was trying to kill us so I deaded him, and then I had to collect from Spice.2006, Leighanne Boyd, Once Upon A Time In The Bricks, page 178
(broadly, slang, transitive, African-American Vernacular) To discontinue or put an end to (something).
- "I thought I told you to shut up," said Jesus. "I don't be laying up with chickenheads, so you need to dead that shit before you piss me the fuck off."2005, Black Artemis, Picture Me Rollin', New York, N.Y.: New American Library, →ISBN, page 269
- "This might be kinda beside the point right now," I said carefully, settling into the chair across from him, "but it's probably time to dead all that open-door no-gun shit, huh?"2013, Adam Mansbach, Rage Is Back, New York, N.Y.: Viking, →ISBN, page 140

Noun (4) capitalized: DEAD

DEAD (uncountable)

(abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of diethyl azodicarboxylate.
(abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of destruction of enemy air defense(s).

Also used as

dead is also the clipping of deadlift.

dead meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Bengali and Sanskrit

dead in Hindi

no longer alive: मृत mŕt, मरा हुआ marā huā, मुर्दा murdā, निर्जीव nirjīv
devoid of living things, barren: बंजर bañjar
without emotion: भावहीन bhāvhīn

dead in Bengali

no longer alive: মৃত mrito, মুর্দা murda
idiomatic: hated: মুর্দা murda

dead in Sanskrit

no longer alive: मृत mṛtá

More languagesFewer languages

dead in Sinhala: මළ maḷa
dead in Nepali: मृत mr̥t, मरेको mareko
dead in Pashto: مړ mar
dead in Tagalog: patay
dead in Arabic: مَيِّت mayyit
dead in Malay: mati
dead in Indonesian: mati, meninggal
dead in Persian: مرده morde
dead in Thai: ตาย dtaai, เสียชีวิต sǐia-chii-wít
dead in Vietnamese: chết
dead in Myanmar: သေ se

Examples of dead in a sentence

The villagers are mourning their dead.
The dead are always with us, in our hearts.
Lily was pronounced dead at the scene.
A storekeeper downtown was shot dead last evening.
He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
Was it possible to exist upon a dead world?1913, Arthur Conan Doyle, “(please specify the page)”, in The Poison Belt […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC:

All 40 example sentences with dead

Synonyms of dead

30 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of dead

Forms of dead

Adjective
comparative	deader
superlative	deadest
Noun
plural	deads
Verb
third-person singular present	deads
present participle	deading
past participle	deaded
past	deaded

Origin of dead

From Middle English ded, deed, from Old English dēad, from Proto-West Germanic *daud, from Proto-Germanic *daudaz. Compare West Frisian dead, dea, Dutch dood, German tot, Danish and Norwegian Bokmål død, Norwegian Nynorsk daud, Swedish död.

Words formed from dead

Phrases with dead

169 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with dead

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about dead

What does dead mean?: Dead means no longer living; deceased. (Also used as a noun.).
What is dead in Hindi?: Dead in Hindi is मृत (mŕt), मरा हुआ (marā huā), मुर्दा (murdā). See Dead meaning in Hindi.
How do you use dead in a sentence?: The villagers are mourning their dead.
What part of speech is dead?: Dead can be an adjective, an adverb, a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce dead?: Dead is pronounced /dɛd/.

Words near dead in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: dead (page history and authors); DEAD (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

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-dead.ogg, en-au-dead.ogg.

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