difficult
/ˈdɪfɪkəlt/
difficult adjective: hard, not easy, requiring much effort.
Adjective
difficult (comparative more difficult, superlative most difficult)
- Hard, not easy, requiring much effort.
- difficult of accomplishment
- However, the difficult weather conditions will ensure Yunnan has plenty of freshwater.
- Hard to manage, uncooperative, troublesome.
- Stop being difficult and eat your broccoli—you know it's good for you.
- Unable or unwilling.
- “I hope, madam,” said Jones, “my charming Lady Bellaston will be as difficult to believe anything against one who is so sensible of the many obligations she hath conferred upon him.”1749, Henry Fielding, The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling
Verb
difficult (third-person singular simple present difficults, present participle difficulting, simple past and past participle difficulted)
difficult meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
difficult in Hindi
- hard, not easy
- कठिन kaṭhin, विकट vikaṭ, मुश्किल muśkil, दुश्वार duśvār, दूभर dūbhar
difficult in Tamil
- hard, not easy
- கடினமான kaṭiṉamāṉa
difficult in Marathi
- hard, not easy
- अवघड avghaḍ, कठीण kaṭhīṇ
difficult in Urdu
- hard, not easy
- مشکل muśkil, دشوار duśvār, کٹھن kaṭhin
More languagesFewer languages
- difficult in Bengali
- কঠিন koṭhin
- difficult in Telugu
- కఠినమైన kaṭhinamaina, కష్టమైన kaṣṭamaina
- difficult in Malayalam
- കട്ടിയുള്ള kaṭṭiyuḷḷa, കട്ടി kaṭṭi
- difficult in Kannada
- ಕಟ್ kaṭ
- difficult in Punjabi
- ਕਠਿਨ kaṭhin
- difficult in Gujarati
- કઠિન kaṭhin
- difficult in Odia
- କଷ୍ଟସାଧ୍ଯ଼, କଷ୍ଟକର
- difficult in Sanskrit
- कठिन kaṭhina
- difficult in Sinhala
- අමාරු amāru
- difficult in Assamese
- টান tan
- difficult in Nepali
- गाह्रो gāhro, अप्ठ्यारो apṭhyāro, गह्रुङ्गो gahruṅgo, गह्रौं gahra͠u
- difficult in Pashto
- ګران grân, مشکل muškil
- difficult in Tagalog
- mahirap
- difficult in Arabic
- صَعْب ṣaʕb
- difficult in Malay
- sukar, susah
- difficult in Indonesian
- sukar, susah, sulit
- difficult in Persian
- دشوار došvâr, مشکل moškel, سخت saxt, صعب sa'b
- difficult in Thai
- ยาก yâak, ลำบาก lam-bàak
- difficult in Vietnamese
- khó, khó khăn
- difficult in Myanmar
- ခဲယဉ်း hkai:yany:, ခက် hkak
Examples of difficult in a sentence
- If they're difficult, offer them more.
- There is not the strength or courage left me to venture into the wide, strange, difficult world, alone.1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 17, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC:
- In adults, the same kind of anger has been studied in people trying to solve a very difficult math problem.2008, Daniel Goleman, Destructive Emotions: A Scientific Dialogue with the Dalai Lama, →ISBN, page 199:
Synonyms of difficult
Antonyms
Forms of difficult
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | more difficult |
| superlative | most difficult |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | difficults |
| present participle | difficulting |
| past participle | difficulted |
| past | difficulted |
Origin of difficult
From Middle English difficult (ca. 1400), a back-formation from difficulte (whence modern difficulty), from Old French difficulté, from Latin difficultas, from difficul, older form of difficilis (“hard to do, difficult”), from dis- + facilis (“easy”); see difficile. Replaced native Middle English earveþ (“difficult, hard”), from Old English earfoþe (“difficult, laborious, full of hardship”), cognate to German Arbeit (“work”). The verb is from the adjective, partly after Middle French difficulter and its etymon Latin difficultō. Compare difficilitate, difficultate, and Italian difficoltare.
Words formed from difficult
Phrases with difficult
Questions about difficult
- What does difficult mean?
- Difficult means hard, not easy, requiring much effort.
- What is difficult in Hindi?
- Difficult in Hindi is कठिन (kaṭhin), विकट (vikaṭ), मुश्किल (muśkil). See Difficult meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use difficult in a sentence?
- If they're difficult, offer them more.
- What part of speech is difficult?
- Difficult can be an adjective or a verb.
- How do you pronounce difficult?
- Difficult is pronounced /ˈdɪfɪkəlt/.
Words near difficult in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: difficult (page history and authors); കട്ടി (Malayalam) (page history and authors); difficult (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); अप्ठ्यारो (Nepali) (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:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-uk-difficult.ogg, En-us-difficult.ogg.
Cite this entry: “difficult.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/difficult. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.