tedious
Americanadjective
-
marked by monotony or tedium; long and tiresome.
tedious tasks; a tedious journey.
- Synonyms:
- dull, monotonous, boring, wearing
-
wordy so as to cause weariness or boredom, as a speaker, a writer, or the work they produce; prolix.
adjective
-
causing fatigue or tedium; monotonous
-
obsolete progressing very slowly
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of tedious
First recorded in 1375–1425; late Middle English, from Medieval Latin tēdiōsus, Late Latin taediōsus, from taedi(um) tedium + -ōsus -ous
Explanation
If something is tedious, it's boring. If you're anxious to get outside and enjoy the sun, even the best lecture will seem tedious. Tedious is the adjective from tedium, which is both Latin and English for boredom. You ordinarily wouldn't use tedious for people, just things; you might say "His speeches are tedious," but usually not "He is tedious." Something that is tedious could also be called tiresome. Shakespeare's Friar Laurence says "I will be brief, for my short date of breath / Is not so long as is a tedious tale."
Vocabulary lists containing tedious
List 2
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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.
But the idea that a documentary that isn’t detailing some recent or mysterious event is inherently tedious is a gross misconception.
From Salon ● Oct. 28, 2026
Coming up with prompts could be easy some days—“Explain this at a sixth-grade level”— or more tedious when it came to teaching AI about, say, technical specifications.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 17, 2026
They had little choice about their potential victims - in the end it was Jerry Hall and Ross Kemp who wandered in to join Maya and James A in deliberately tedious conversation.
From BBC ● Oct. 17, 2026
In 2008, John Swansburg argued that we should ditch this particular festivity: “Seems like a nice idea, the birthday dinner. It is not. It is a tedious, wretched affair.”
From Slate ● Oct. 16, 2026
The cyclotron’s celebrity as a technological phenomenon fed on itself, fueling its inventor’s preference for engineering and salesmanship over the tedious drudgery of hard science.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
