Word.ws English Dictionary

mal-

mal- prefix: evil.

Prefix

mal-

  1. evil
    • malism, malinfluence
    Synonyms:
    mis-
  2. unhealthy, harmful
    • maleffect
    Synonyms:
    mis-
  3. unpleasant
    • malodor
    Synonyms:
    mis-
  4. incorrect
    • maldifferentiation
    Synonyms:
    mis-, para-, dis-, dys-
  5. incomplete, unfinished
    • maldescent
    Synonyms:
    mis-
  6. poorly, deficiently
    • malfed, malnourished, malcirculation
    Synonyms:
    mis-, under-, hypo-, dys-
  7. unintentional, mistaken, accidental
    • malcommunication
    Synonyms:
    mis-
  8. not
    • maladherence, malcontent
    Synonyms:
    a-, an-, dys-, in-, non-, un-

Synonyms of mal-

1 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Origin of mal-

From Old French mal- from Latin male (“badly”), from malus (“bad”).

Questions about mal-

What does mal- mean?
Mal- means evil.
What part of speech is mal-?
Mal- is a prefix.

Words near mal- in the dictionary

  1. mal du pays
  2. mal du siècle
  3. mal du Suisse
  4. mal mariée
  5. mal mariées
  6. mal-
  7. Mal-ay
  8. mal-developed
  9. mal-di-gomma
  10. mal-parries
  11. mal-parry

Source and license

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

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