boredom
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of boredom
Explanation
Boredom can make you do crazy things, like watching terrible old game shows on television or eating the bag of chocolate chips you find in the freezer. The feeling of being bored or uninterested in what you're doing is boredom. Everyone experiences boredom sometimes. The feeling that nothing catches your interest, that everything's dull and flat, sums up the state of boredom. Too much time on your hands can result in boredom, and so can the tediousness of doing the same thing over and over again, like a dreary task at a job. The word boredom comes from something called a "boring tool", a kind of drill that works slowly and repetitively; around 1768, bore, meaning "be tiresome," became a popular slang term, and boredom followed.
Vocabulary lists containing boredom
"Play Ball!"
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-dom and -hood
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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.
Also, I am afraid your columns do not sufficiently extol the value of work, which Voltaire rightly claimed protects us from the evils of boredom, vice, and poverty.
From MarketWatch • May 13, 2026
“Digital environments become the easiest and most reliable way to regulate mood, boredom, or stress, so they gradually start to crowd everything else out.”
From Slate • May 12, 2026
“I felt that boredom was, to Louisianans, or must be, much worse than corruption,” Ms. Lemann writes.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 23, 2026
Phones and tablets have provided people of all ages with an ever-present source of entertainment, but Jane says that both adults and children could benefit from embracing boredom a bit more.
From BBC • Mar. 26, 2026
It could’ve been a prank, or a trap laid by the Randalls in a fit of boredom.
From "The Underground Railroad: A Novel" by Colson Whitehead
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.
