blighted
Americanadjective
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Plant Pathology. affected with blight, a disease or condition characterized by the rapid and extensive discoloration, wilting, and death of plant tissues.
Small, black fungal fruiting bodies form on the blighted twigs and produce infective spores.
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dilapidated or deteriorated.
They saw the potential for the blighted building to provide affordable housing once renovated, and took on the project.
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(of a region, city, area, etc.) not flourishing; stagnant, run-down, socially depressed, etc..
A new fitness center and natural foods market are replacing a blighted corner with jobs, economic activity, and healthier lifestyles.
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ruined or marred.
The people who forget their past are condemned to a blighted future.
verb
Other Word Forms
- unblighted adjective
- unblightedly adverb
- unblightedness noun
Etymology
Origin of blighted
blight + -ed 2 ( def. ) blight for defs. 1, 2, 4; blight + -ed 3 ( def. ) blight for def. 3; blight + -ed 1 ( def. ) blighted for def. 5
Explanation
Use the adjective blighted to describe something that has a condition that makes it weak or unable to grow, like a blighted lawn with more brown patches than green. Language experts can’t agree on the exact origins of the word blighted, but when it entered English in the sixteenth century it was used to describe a skin condition. Today, you’ll hear the word applied to plants that are affected by a condition that causes them to wither and die, like a blighted tomato crop, or to describe the neglect and decay of places, such as blighted buildings that pose safety hazards.
Vocabulary lists containing blighted
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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Vocabulary Video Contest (2013) - 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.
On a frigid January day Ms. Kozma drove me around a dense industrial area, pointing out how factory construction has blighted the landscape and disrupted traffic.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 18, 2026
O’Brien is right, we desperately need hope, something to hold onto when the world and the film industry are at their most bleak and blighted.
From Salon • Mar. 16, 2026
Mero, in collaboration with fellow street artist Wild Life, has turned the blighted space into a fantastical haven with a knight, a dragon and more — a decaying castle from a bygone era.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 4, 2026
Russian figure skating prodigy Kamila Valieva returns to competitive sport on Saturday hoping to roll back the years in a once promising career blighted by a doping scandal.
From Barron's • Jan. 30, 2026
It was a blighted, hellish place full of noise and dust and smoke and inhuman towers that blocked the sun, and she hated it—hated especially this gloomy building and the ceaseless clamor of construction.
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
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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.