cruel
Americanadjective
-
crueler,
comparative
-
cruelest
superlative
-
willfully or knowingly causing pain or distress to others.
- Synonyms:
- relentless, merciless, ferocious, bloodthirsty
- Antonyms:
- kind
-
enjoying the pain or distress of others.
the cruel spectators of the gladiatorial contests.
- Antonyms:
- compassionate, sympathetic
-
causing or marked by great pain or distress.
a cruel remark;
a cruel affliction.
-
rigid; stern; strict; unrelentingly severe.
adjective
-
causing or inflicting pain without pity
a cruel teacher
-
causing pain or suffering
a cruel accident
Synonym Usage
Cruel, pitiless, ruthless, brutal, savage imply readiness to cause pain to others. Cruel implies willingness to cause pain, and indifference to suffering: a cruel stepfather. Pitiless adds the idea of refusal to show compassion: pitiless to captives. Ruthless implies cruelty and unscrupulousness, letting nothing stand in one's way: ruthless greed. Brutal implies cruelty that takes the form of physical violence: a brutal master. Savage suggests fierceness and brutality: savage battles.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of cruel
First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English, from Anglo-French, Old French, from Latin crūdēlis, equivalent to crūd(us) ( see crude) + -ēlis, adjective suffix
Explanation
Someone or something that inflicts pain or causes suffering can be described as cruel. It would be cruel of you to offer chocolate to someone on a diet. High school can be cruel sometimes: cruel teachers, who seem to organize to all pile on the papers and tests for the same day; cruel students, who are mean to each other; and even cruel cafeteria workers, who create disgusting concoctions out of mystery meat. Through its Latin ancestors — crudelis "rude and unfeeling" and crudus "raw or rude" — cruel is related to the English word crude, meaning rude or not fully formed.
Vocabulary lists containing cruel
Schooled
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Messenger
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"Seeking Freedom"
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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:
Anthropic’s October Usage Policy Update included a section prohibiting “sustained and needless abusive or cruel behavior toward our models.”
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 24, 2026
That message — a howl of righteous anger at state corruption and the perversion of religion to serve the nefarious agendas of cruel, power-mad men — is what makes “The Devils” sacrilegious yet not apostate.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 16, 2026
But what Anthropic would consider "abusive or cruel behaviour" towards its models remains unclear.
From BBC ● Oct. 9, 2026
I know that to modern ears, what I just described, this way of life, may sound odd; it may even sound cruel.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 8, 2026
“Yes. Pax painted portraits of his sister his whole life long. As cruel as he was to her, he never forgot her.”
From "The Long-Lost Home" by Maryrose Wood
Trump’s treatment of Cornyn was crueler than that of Cassidy.
From Slate ● May 30, 2026
If every author is a parent to their characters, then Austen, Mary’s true mother, is a good deal crueler than Mrs. Bennet.
From Salon ● May 20, 2026
I recognize, of course, that life isn’t fair and that many families are grappling with circumstances far crueler than ours.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 22, 2025
And then the even crueler twist: The threatened bolts of lightning, the thunder, rain and pea-sized hailstones never reached Pasadena.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 22, 2023
“I wasn’t mean, just...honest. Wouldn’t it be crueler to make him think there was some hope that I’d come around and just embrace all of this?”
From "When Dimple Met Rishi" by Sandhya Menon
I just think one of the cruelest things you can do is to coddle your child in a false reality versus helping them figure out the real reality.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2026
But at the same time, even under the cruelest dictatorships, it has still managed to produce fine literature.
From Barron's ● May 21, 2026
Some Wall Street analysts are insisting that April — contrary to its label as the cruelest month — is actually one of the better months for the U.S. stock market.
From MarketWatch ● Apr. 1, 2026
It was one of the cruelest play-offs I’ve ever seen in my decades of Oscar viewing, and an even bigger offense considering the ceremony’s insistence on positioning itself as a celebration of international film.
From Salon ● Mar. 16, 2026
We made our government write new laws to alter some of the cruelest injustices that affected us.
From "While the World Watched: A Birmingham Bombing Survivor Comes of Age during the Civil Rights Movement" by Carolyn Maull McKinstry
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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.
