Word.ws English Dictionary

hard-boiled

hard-boiled adjective: of a boiled egg, cooked to a solid consistency. Also the simple past and past participle of hard-boil.

Adjective

hard-boiled (comparative more hard-boiled, superlative most hard-boiled)

  1. Of a boiled egg, cooked to a solid consistency.
    Antonyms:
    runny, soft-boiled
  2. (figuratively) Of a person, especially a detective, callous and unsentimental.
    • He told me afterward that he tried to find his folks and square himself—and maybe it was the truth—but some of the hard-boiled townspeople found him, instead, and he had a running fight all the way to the depot.1916 March 11, Charles E. Van Loan, “His Folks”, in Saturday Evening Post
    • 'Some big, hard-boiled egg meets up with a pretty face, and bingo! He cracks up and melts.'1932, Delos W. Lovelace, King Kong, published 1965, page 31
  3. (figuratively, especially detective fiction) Written in a laconic, dispassionate, often ironic style for a realistic, unsentimental effect.

Also used as

hard-boiled is also the simple past and past participle of hard-boil.

hard-boiled meaning in Malay

hard-boiled in Malay

of an egg
rebus keras

Synonyms of hard-boiled

24 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of hard-boiled

Forms of hard-boiled

comparativemore hard-boiled
superlativemost hard-boiled
alternative formhardboiled
alternative formhard boiled

Words formed from hard-boiled

Questions about hard-boiled

What does hard-boiled mean?
Hard-boiled means of a boiled egg, cooked to a solid consistency.
What is hard-boiled in Malay?
Hard-boiled in Malay is rebus keras. See Hard-boiled meaning in Malay.
What part of speech is hard-boiled?
Hard-boiled is an adjective.

Words near hard-boiled in the dictionary

  1. hard-block
  2. hard-blocked
  3. hard-blocking
  4. hard-blocks
  5. hard-boil
  6. hard-boiled
  7. hard-boiledness
  8. hard-boiling
  9. hard-boils
  10. hard-brick
  11. hard-charging

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hard-boiled (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-hard-boiled.wav.

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