heartening
Britishadjective
Explanation
Something heartening reassures or inspires you. You'll feel better after struggling with a long English essay when you read your teacher's heartening comments. If you're halfway through a marathon, the sight of your friends cheering you on is heartening. A shy new student will also find the warm welcome he gets from his classmates to be extremely heartening. This cheerful adjective comes from the verb hearten. "give confidence," or "encourage," which is rooted in a figurative sense of heart — to "give heart to" means "to give confidence to."
Vocabulary lists containing heartening
An Elephant in the Garden
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Favorable
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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.
All of that might sound heartening for people hoping that humans will remain central to the creation of culture.
From BBC ● Oct. 10, 2026
"I find it very heartening," 24-year-old Magnus Bjerg Sturm told AFP at the Social Democrats party at a Stockholm conference centre.
From Barron's ● Sep. 13, 2026
Not to tout major corporations too much, but it is heartening to see that even businesses worth billions of dollars have their customer in mind, too.
From Salon ● Sep. 11, 2026
At a time when drama has come to depend on celebrity leads and commercial hype, this bounty of understated excellence is heartening.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 8, 2026
“They are more heartening and acceptable during times of stress.”
From "Fallout: Spies, Superbombs, and the Ultimate Cold War Showdown" by Steve Sheinkin
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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.
