Word.ws English Dictionary

gladder

/ˈɡlædə(ɹ)/

gladder is the comparative form of glad.

gladder is the alternative form of gladden.

Meaning of glad

Adjective

glad (comparative gladder or more glad, superlative gladdest or most glad)

  1. (predicative, usually) Pleased; happy; gratified.
    • I'm glad the rain has finally stopped.
  2. (obsolete, predicative, usually) Having a bright or cheerful appearance; expressing or exciting joy; producing gladness.
    • Her conversation / More glad to me than to a miser money is.a. 1587, Philippe Sidnei [i.e., Philip Sidney], “(please specify the folio)”, in [Fulke Greville; Matthew Gwinne; John Florio], editors, The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia [The New Arcadia], London...

See all 5 meanings of glad

Meaning of gladden

Verb

gladden (third-person singular simple present gladdens, present participle gladdening, simple past and past participle gladdened)

  1. (transitive) To cause (something) to become more glad.
    • A balmy night! and tho' the stars be dim, / Yet let us think upon the vernal showers / That gladden the green earth, and we shall find / A pleasure in the dimness of the stars.1798, William Wordsworth, The Nightingale
  2. (archaic, intransitive) To become more glad in one's disposition.
    Synonyms:
    cheer up, perk up

See all 3 meanings of gladden

Forms of gladder

third-person singular presentgladders
present participlegladdering
past participlegladdered
pastgladdered

Origin of gladder

From Middle English gladere, from Old English glædra (adjective), glador (adverb), comparative of glæd (“glad, shining, bright”). More at glad.

From gladder (“one who makes glad”), or perhaps from Middle English *gladderen, from Old English *gladrian (“to make glad”), equivalent to glad + -er (fequentative suffix).

Words that rhyme with gladder

Questions about gladder

What is gladder the comparative form of?
Gladder is the comparative form of glad.
How do you pronounce gladder?
Gladder is pronounced /ˈɡlædə(ɹ)/.

Words near gladder in the dictionary

  1. gladdening someone's heart
  2. gladdeningly
  3. gladdenings
  4. gladdens
  5. gladdens someone's heart
  6. gladder
  7. gladdered
  8. gladdest
  9. gladdie
  10. gladdies
  11. gladding

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: gladder (page history and authors); glad (page history and authors); gladden (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.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-gladder.ogg, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-gladder.wav.

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