vast
Americanadjective
-
vaster,
comparative
-
vastest
superlative
-
of very great area or extent; immense.
the vast reaches of outer space.
- Synonyms:
- stupendous, colossal, gigantic, boundless, measureless
- Antonyms:
- small
-
of very great size or proportions; huge; enormous.
vast piles of rubble left in the wake of the war.
-
very great in number, quantity, amount, etc..
vast sums of money.
-
very great in degree, intensity, etc..
an artisan of vast skill.
noun
adjective
-
unusually large in size, extent, degree, or number; immense
-
(prenominal) (intensifier)
in vast haste
noun
-
poetic immense or boundless space
-
dialect a very great amount or number
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of vast
First recorded in 1565–75, from Latin vastus “empty, immense”
Explanation
If you’re in a boat out on the water and you can’t see any land, then the body of water you’re in is probably vast, or enormous. Things that are described as vast include oceans, seas, the heavens, deserts, and the surface of the moon. Even places that can't be seen or touched, like imaginations, are called vast, because of the endless ideas that come out of them. Someone with a vast imagination is very creative, and a place with a vast landscape is very large. Possibilities are vast, and so are the vocabularies of the world, filling vast volumes.
Vocabulary lists containing vast
Figurative Language in King's "I Have a Dream" Speech (1963)
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"The Ravine," Vocabulary from the short story
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Unit 1: Telling Details
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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.
See Examples For:
U.S. officials say Hengli is one of the biggest players in a vast ecosystem of “teapot” refineries in China that for years have been buying sanctioned oil.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 16, 2026
"Confidence and reciprocity are beginning to take shape to open the door to engagement on the most difficult issues," says Gagnon whom we meet inside the UN's vast, heavily fortified compound.
From BBC ● Aug. 14, 2026
Now, the streaming giant wants to make it easier for viewers to find them on its vast and eclectic platform.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 14, 2026
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC, is a vast network of ocean currents that carries warm water northward from the tropics.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 14, 2026
He stood at their very roots: craning his neck at vast, swooping ice-faces, at black peaks that pierced the clouds.
From "Wolf Brother" by Michelle Paver
The lands whose governance was at stake are vaster than any nation, and it’s possible the consequences of the vote will be felt for eons.
From Salon ● Aug. 19, 2024
But scientists like Philip Riris have taken a broader approach, looking for enduring patterns of human behavior on a vaster scale of time and space.
From New York Times ● May 1, 2024
And while disposing treated water in the ocean is common practice for nuclear plants, critics have pointed out that the amount being released from Fukushima is on an unprecedented, far vaster scale.
From BBC ● Aug. 24, 2023
The temple/palace system in Egypt therefore operated on a much vaster scale than anywhere in Mesopotamia.
From Textbooks ● Apr. 19, 2023
This finding alone would have ensured Hubble’s reputation, but he now turned to the question of working out just how much vaster the universe was, and made an even more striking discovery.
From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson
“Your handshake came over the vastest ocean in the world,” Zhou told Nixon as they rode to the guest quarters that Tuesday.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 20, 2022
Baggage handling should be neither seen nor heard, though it’s the vastest operation of all.
From The New Yorker ● Feb. 1, 2016
Everyone’s strings are being pulled by someone, with, as Voltaire wrote, silence being “the verdict of the vastest mind.”
From New York Times ● Oct. 26, 2010
Today, Ober owns several stores in a South Coast Plaza that is the vastest and most prosperous of all of Orange County’s many temples of shopping.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 17, 1990
Now Odin and his sons took the body of Ymir—the vastest body that ever was—and they flung it into the Chasm of Chasms, filling up all the hollow places with it.
From The Children of Odin The Book of Northern Myths by Willy Pogany
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.
