goodness

/ˈɡʊdnəs/

goodness noun: the state or characteristic of being good. Also the clipping of goodness me or various similar exclamations such as goodness gracious.

Noun

goodness (countable and uncountable, plural goodnesses)

(uncountable) The state or characteristic of being good.
- There is ſome ſoule of goodneſſe in things euill, / VVould men obſeruingly 'diſtill it out.1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount...
- Rich, raisiny, smoky, coffee goodness: that is the flavor of urfa biber.2014 October 7, Amanda Bevill, Julie Kramis Hearne, World Spice at Home: New Flavors for 75 Favorite Dishes, Sasquatch Books, →ISBN, page 42
(countable) The good, nutritional, healthy part or content of something.
(euphemistic, uncountable) God.
- Thank goodness that the war is over!
The moral qualities which constitute Christian excellence; moral virtue.
- But the fruit of the ſpirit is loue, ioy, peace, long ſuffering, gentleneſſe, goodneſſe, faith, / Meekeneſſe, temperance: againſt ſuch there is no law.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Galatians 5:22–23, column 2

Also used as

goodness is also the clipping of goodness me or various similar exclamations such as goodness gracious.

goodness meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Bengali

goodness in Tamil

state or characteristic of being good: நல்லது nallatu

goodness in Bengali

মঙ্গলভাব

More languagesFewer languages

goodness in Telugu: మంచితనము mañcitanamu
goodness in Kannada: ಒಳ್ಳೆಯತನ
goodness in Punjabi: ਭਲਿਆਈ
goodness in Gujarati: ભલાઈ
goodness in Tagalog: buti
goodness in Arabic: خَيْر ḵayr, صَلَاح ṣalāḥ
goodness in Vietnamese: lòng tốt

Examples of goodness in a sentence

Have the goodness to secure the falls of the mizzen halyards.
The dentist gave me novocaine to numb my tooth before drilling, thank goodness.
My goodness, James certainly is a prime example of manhood, isn't he?

All 40 example sentences with goodness

Synonyms of goodness

Antonyms

7 more antonymsFewer antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of goodness

Forms of goodness

plural	goodnesses

Origin of goodness

From Middle English goodnesse, godnesse, from Old English gōdnes (“goodness; virtue; kindness”), from Proto-West Germanic *gōdnassī (“goodness”), equivalent to good + -ness. Cognate with Scots guidness (“goodness”), West Frisian goedens (“goodness”), Old High German guotnessī (“goodness”), Middle High German guotnisse (“goodness”), Russian годность (godnostʹ, “suitability, fitness”).

Words formed from goodness

Phrases with goodness

gracious goodness

Questions about goodness

What does goodness mean?: Goodness means the state or characteristic of being good.
What is goodness in Hindi?: Goodness in Hindi is अच्छाई. See Goodness meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is goodness?: Goodness is a noun.
How do you pronounce goodness?: Goodness is pronounced /ˈɡʊdnəs/.
What is the plural of goodness?: The plural of goodness is goodnesses.

Words near goodness in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: goodness (page history and authors); goodness (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); goodness (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); goodness (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); goodness (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); goodness (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); goodness (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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-goodness.ogg.

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