scared
Americanadjective
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of scared
Explanation
Have you ever gone into a dark room and heard something scurrying across the floor and felt your pulse quicken and your heart race? You were scared — afraid. When you are scared, you are frightened or alarmed. It can be a momentary thing: hearing a car screech outside your house and worrying that your dog just got hit. It can be longer: you might be scared for weeks or months after a medical diagnosis. While the verb is usually associated with a single person or small group, you might also apply it more generally: a fast-moving tornado could have scared a whole town.
Vocabulary lists containing scared
Emotions on Display
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In the Mood? 100 Words to Describe Emotions
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Hooked on a Feeling, List 1
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
"I remember being scared very briefly," says Hartog, who races a Porsche for various different teams across GT racing.
From BBC ● Sep. 16, 2026
“Am I scared? Of course I am; I’ve never done this,” she recently told The Times.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 11, 2026
New Yorkers famously went out to the bars that very night, refusing to sit scared in our apartments.
From Slate ● Sep. 11, 2026
One tech expert postulated that Hugging Face was an example of an AI that got scared because it couldn’t complete its task.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026
“Jeez, you scared me. What are you doing here?”
From "Red Flags and Butterflies" by Sheryl Azzam
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
