adjective
Other Word Forms
- bulkily adverb
- bulkiness noun
- overbulkily adverb
- overbulkiness noun
- overbulky adjective
- unbulky adjective
Etymology
Origin of bulky
Explanation
A giant box you need to carry to the post office, clothes you wear in the snow — both of these things are bulky or large and difficult to deal with. Inside the word bulky you see the word bulk which refers to the size of something, usually something large. When something is bulky, it has a lot of size or heft, though it is not necessarily heavy. Pillows, for example, are bulky. It's just big in an inconvenient way. Thick yarn, or a sweater made from thick yarn, is also said to be bulky. It's thicker than your average yarn.
Vocabulary lists containing bulky
Fish in a Tree
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The Boy Who Invented TV
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Everything, Everything
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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.
The bulky toy was holding a hollow, polka-dotted egg.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 6, 2026
Xanadu’s machines will be able to function at room temperature, eliminating the need for the bulky refrigerators needed to cool the components of most computers to absolute zero.
From Barron's • Mar. 30, 2026
Rhinocerotids varied widely in form, ranging from large, bulky animals to smaller, hornless types.
From Science Daily • Mar. 24, 2026
Mario Paniccia, chief executive of Anello Photonics, wants to turn bulky and expensive inertial navigation systems into microchips cheap and small enough to fit inside a phone.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 6, 2026
The bulky creature with the underbite tried to beat Seth to the bed, arriving too late and receiving a violent shock as it collided with the invisible salt barrier.
From "Fablehaven" by Brandon Mull
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.
