sadness
/ˈsædnəs/
sadness noun: the state or emotion of being sad.
Noun
sadness (countable and uncountable, plural sadnesses)
- The state or emotion of being sad.
- But sorrow that is couch'd in seeming gladness
Is like that mirth fate turns to sudden sadness.c. 1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and... - I mean not then under the name of Sadneſs to defend effeminate Bewailings and Lamentations; let them that ſubject themſelves to this weakeſt Impatience, be alſo ſubject to the Lycian Law, that bound theſe kind of Lamenters to be array'd like Women: […]1707, John Dunton, “Mourning Joy: or a Paradox in Praiſe of Sadneſs”, in Athenian Sport[:] […] , page 423
- Synonyms:
- forlornness, melancholy
- But sorrow that is couch'd in seeming gladness
- An event in one's life that causes sadness.
- She has experienced many sadnesses in her forty years.
- Synonyms:
- misfortune, woe, affliction, aggrievance, distress, grief, grievance, hardship, misery, ruth
sadness meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
sadness in Hindi
- state/emotion
- दुःख duḥkh, ग़म ġam, उदासी udāsī
sadness in Tamil
- வருத்தம், சோகம், துக்கம்
sadness in Marathi
- दुःख
sadness in Urdu
- state/emotion
- دکھ dukh
More languagesFewer languages
- sadness in Bengali
- দুঃখ dukkho, দেরেগ dereg, গোসা gōśa, নারাজী naraji
- sadness in Malayalam
- ദുഃഖം duḥkhaṁ, സങ്കടം saṅkaṭaṁ, വ്യാകുലത vyākulata, വ്യസനം vyasanaṁ
- sadness in Kannada
- ದುಃಖ duḥkha
- sadness in Punjabi
- ਦੁੱਖ dukkha, ਦੁਖ dukh
- sadness in Assamese
- বেজাৰ bezar, দুখ dukh
- sadness in Tagalog
- lungkot, kalungkutan
- sadness in Arabic
- حُزْن ḥuzn
- sadness in Indonesian
- kesedihan
- sadness in Persian
- غمگینی ġamgini
- sadness in Thai
- ความเศร้า kwaam sâo, ความทุกข์ kwaam-túk
- sadness in Vietnamese
- buồn, sự buồn rầu
Examples of sadness in a sentence
- More than 40% of high school students said that feelings of sadness or hopelessness prevented them from engaging in their regular activities for at least two weeks of the year.2023 February 13, Deidre McPhillips, “Teens, especially girls, are experiencing more violence, suicidal thoughts and mental health...
- The compassion to yourself comes in validating the feelings your inner child is having –– the stress, fear, anger or sadness — and make adult decisions about the best way to move forward, Lev said.2025 April 28, Madeline Holcombe, “It might be time to ‘reparent’ yourself. Here’s how to get started”, in CNN:
Synonyms of sadness
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
- misery
- sorrow
- undelight
- vexation
- wrong
- blueness
- tristesse
- mirthless
- blues
- crestfallenness
- dejection
- depression
- despondency
- dolefulness
- downheartedness
- ill-being
- infelicity
- melancholia
- mourn
- sorrowfulness
- tristfulness
- unhappiness
- woefare
- wretchedness
- ruth
- drearihead
- heartsore
- mishappiness
- prosternation
- regret
Antonyms
Forms of sadness
| plural | sadnesses |
|---|---|
| alternative form (obsolete) | sadnesse |
Origin of sadness
From Middle English sadnesse, equivalent to sad + -ness.
Questions about sadness
- What does sadness mean?
- Sadness means the state or emotion of being sad.
- What is sadness in Hindi?
- Sadness in Hindi is दुःख (duḥkh), ग़म (ġam), उदासी (udāsī). See Sadness meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use sadness in a sentence?
- More than 40% of high school students said that feelings of sadness or hopelessness prevented them from engaging in their regular activities for at least two weeks of the year.
- What part of speech is sadness?
- Sadness is a noun.
- How do you pronounce sadness?
- Sadness is pronounced /ˈsædnəs/.
- What is the plural of sadness?
- The plural of sadness is sadnesses.
Words near sadness in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: sadness (page history and authors); sadness (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); sadness (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); അഴൽ (Malayalam) (page history and authors); ದುಃಖ (Kannada) (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-us-sadness.ogg.
Cite this entry: “sadness.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sadness. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.