Word.ws English Dictionary

unfriendly

/ʌnˈfɹɛn(d)li/

unfriendly adjective: not friendly; hostile; mean.

Adjective

unfriendly (comparative unfriendlier or more unfriendly, superlative unfriendliest or most unfriendly)

  1. Not friendly; hostile; mean.
    • Shrekkies will notice that the musical is going off-piste from the film right from the start when the curtain rises to reveal a seven-year-old Shrek turfed out into an unfriendly world by his parents.2008 November 3, Tom Leonard, “Will Shrek be a monster hit on Broadway?”, in The Daily Telegraph, number 47,718, page 29
    • The reputations of our universities and our research base are already under threat because of the fallout from the EU referendum result, which is making the UK an unfriendlier place for overseas scholars and students, as well as cutting off access to an important stream of research funding and to a...2016 October 18, Stephen Curry, “Why the Higher Education and Research Bill must be amended”, in The Guardian
    Synonyms:
    dour
  2. Unfavourable.
    Synonyms:
    chilly

Noun

unfriendly (plural unfriendlies)

  1. An enemy.
    • Sweep the valley compound and eliminate any unfriendlies you encounter.2005, Ted Dekker, Thunder of Heaven, page 217
    • You see, the mission of almost every teenage girl on the loose is to first identify the targets, just like a war. These include the primary objective (the boy), the enemy (other girls), the friendlies (sympathetic girl friends and the boy's family), and unfriendlies (other boys).2008, Dennis Wengert, A Very Healthy Insanity, page 44

Adverb

unfriendly (comparative unfriendlier or more unfriendly, superlative unfriendliest or most unfriendly)

  1. in an unkind or unfriendly manner; not as a friend

unfriendly meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

unfriendly in Hindi

not friendly; hostile
रूखा rūkhā

unfriendly in Tamil

நட்பற்ற, நட்பற்றவர், நட்பற்றது

unfriendly in Urdu

غیر دوستانہ, بے دوستانہ

unfriendly in Bengali

বন্ধুত্বহীন
More languagesFewer languages
unfriendly in Telugu
స్నేహపూర్వకంగా లేనిది
unfriendly in Malayalam
സൗഹൃദപരമല്ലാത്ത, മെെത്രീഭാവമില്ലാത്ത, സ്നേഹശൂന്യമായ, ശത്രുത്വമായ
unfriendly in Kannada
ನಣ್ಪು ತೋರದ, ಗೆಡೆಗೊಳ್ಳದ, ಮರುಕವಿಲ್ಲದ, ಒಲವಿಲ್ಲದ
unfriendly in Punjabi
ਗ਼ੈਰ-ਦੋਸਤਾਨਾ
unfriendly in Gujarati
બિન-મૈત્રીપૂર્ણ
unfriendly in Odia
ବନ୍ଧୁତ୍ୱହୀନ
unfriendly in Pashto
بدمخی bədmə́xay

Synonyms of unfriendly

Antonyms

Forms of unfriendly

Adjective
comparativeunfriendlier
comparativemore unfriendly
superlativeunfriendliest
superlativemost unfriendly
Noun
pluralunfriendlies
Adverb
comparativeunfriendlier
comparativemore unfriendly
superlativeunfriendliest
superlativemost unfriendly

Origin of unfriendly

From Middle English unfrendly, unfrendli, unfrendely, from Old English *unfrēondlīċ (suggested by derivative unfrēondlīċe (“in an unfriendly manner; unfriendly”, adverb)), equivalent to un- + friendly. Cognate with Saterland Frisian uunfrüntelk, uunfjuntelk (“unfriendly”), West Frisian ûnfreonlik (“unfriendly”), Dutch onvriendelijk (“unfriendly”), German Low German unfrünnelk (“unfriendly”), German unfreundlich (“unfriendly”), Faroese ófryntligur (“unfriendly”), Icelandic ófrýnilegur (“ugly; disturbing”).

From Middle English unfrendli, from Old English unfrēondlīċe (“in an unfriendly manner”), equivalent to unfriend + -ly.

Words formed from unfriendly

Questions about unfriendly

What does unfriendly mean?
Unfriendly means not friendly; hostile; mean.
What is unfriendly in Hindi?
Unfriendly in Hindi is रूखा (rūkhā). See Unfriendly meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is unfriendly?
Unfriendly can be an adjective, a noun or an adverb.
How do you pronounce unfriendly?
Unfriendly is pronounced /ʌnˈfɹɛn(d)li/.

Words near unfriendly in the dictionary

  1. unfriendliest
  2. unfriendlike
  3. unfriendlily
  4. unfriendliness
  5. unfriendlinesses
  6. unfriendly
  7. unfriends
  8. unfriendship
  9. unfries
  10. unfrighted
  11. unfrighten

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: unfriendly (page history and authors); unfriendly (Tamil, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); unfriendly (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); unfriendly (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); unfriendly (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); unfriendly (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); unfriendly (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); unfriendly (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); unfriendly (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); unfriendly (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); بدمخی (Pashto) (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-unfriendly.ogg.

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