Word.ws English Dictionary

dumb as a doornail

dumb as a doornail adjective: irrefutably or unquestionably dumb.

Adjective

dumb as a doornail

  1. (derogatory, simile) Irrefutably or unquestionably dumb.

Origin of dumb as a doornail

From Middle English dom as a dore-nayle.

Questions about dumb as a doornail

What does dumb as a doornail mean?
Dumb as a doornail means irrefutably or unquestionably dumb.
What part of speech is dumb as a doornail?
Dumb as a doornail is an adjective.

Words near dumb as a doornail in the dictionary

  1. dumb ague
  2. dumb as a bag of hammers
  3. dumb as a box of rocks
  4. dumb as a brick
  5. dumb as a doorknob
  6. dumb as a doornail
  7. dumb as a fish
  8. dumb as a haddock
  9. dumb as a post
  10. dumb as a rock
  11. dumb as a sack of bricks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dumb as a doornail (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-au-dumb as a doornail.ogg.

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