dowdy
1 Americanadjective
-
not stylish; drab; old-fashioned.
Why do you always wear those dowdy old dresses?
- Synonyms:
- frumpy
- Antonyms:
- stylish, fashionable
-
not neat or tidy; shabby.
noun
noun
adjective
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of dowdy1
1300–50; Middle English doude unattractive woman (of uncertain origin) + -y 1 or -y 2
Origin of dowdy2
First recorded in 1935–40; short form
Explanation
Someone dowdy dresses badly and has a shabby, unstylish appearance. If you can’t remember the last time you went shopping, beware, you may be dowdy. People tend to use the word dowdy mostly to describe women, in particular older women. In addition, it not only means shabbily dressed, but also relates specifically to the idea of style, or rather the lack of it. Applied to clothing, it also means out of date, in an old-fashioned, dull sort of way. Wild 1970s-style love beads may be out of style, but they can never be called dowdy! A sensible gray tweed skirt or the person wearing it? Most likely dowdy!
Vocabulary lists containing dowdy
The Picture of Dorian Gray
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Spy School
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Howl's Moving Castle
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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:
Especially because, with this dull, dowdy current iteration dragging its cape into theaters, it already has.
From Salon ● Jun. 27, 2026
The company also saw that its selection was dowdy and uninspiring.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 19, 2026
The priest, Jean-Daniel Lafontant, had come from Haiti to help reopen the House of World Cultures, Berlin’s distinguished but dowdy center for non-European arts and ideas.
From New York Times ● Sep. 4, 2023
The character of Dame Edna began as a dowdy Mrs. Norm Everage, who first took to the stage in Humphries’ hometown of Melbourne in the mid-1950s.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 22, 2023
I felt a little dowdy in my clothes, tbh, which was crap because it’s what’s inside that matters and I’d been proud of my T-shirt and glitter Keds at my house, parental comments aside.
From "From Twinkle, with Love" by Sandhya Menon
The actress dowdies up her portrayal with a glumly unsmiling demeanor and the flat, poignantly cynical vocal delivery of the nerd who’s smarter — and more annoying — than everyone else in the room.
From Washington Post ● Oct. 20, 2016
Julie Andrews, Carol Channing, Ann Margret, Jane Fonda, Vanessa Redgrave and Raquel Welch are the other distinguished dowdies, but it's not really their fault.
From Time Magazine Archive
I know but two duchesses in this wide world who are not dowdies, and one of them is an American.
From Parrot & Co. by MacGrath, Harold
Lady Howard, indeed! why, do you think I'd wear one of her dowdies?
From Evelina, Or, the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World by Burney, Fanny
Even if they try to economize, aren't they always taunted with being dowdies?
From A House-Party Don Gesualdo and A Rainy June by Ouida
Investors are finding refuge in dowdier sectors such as consumer staples.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 17, 2026
It remains to be seen whether Americans will be more willing to wear dowdier, less comfortable but more effective masks to protect themselves and others.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 27, 2020
As the nation’s legislators made their way into the Capitol, glad-handing and back-slapping, the camera’s sweep of the room showed a dowdier, duller and grimmer looking audience than is usual.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 30, 2018
But Mr. Tritle is giving it up for roomier, less plush and decidedly non-Catholic confines on the dowdier Upper West Side.
From New York Times ● Jul. 15, 2011
Out at elbows, out at toes, Out at knees, the urchin goes: Still he laughs, and still he grows Rowdier, dowdier, I suppose.
From The Nursery, March 1873, Vol. XIII. A Monthly Magazine for Youngest People by Various
It was arguably the dowdiest of Britain’s major charities — its highest-profile patron has long been Princess Anne, Queen Elizabeth’s daughter.
From New York Times ● Jul. 14, 2018
Even in a down economy there's no shortage of potential buyers for even the dowdiest of franchises.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 17, 2010
"She'll dress herself up carefully in the evening to sit at home alone with me, and go out to a big dinner party in the dowdiest gown she's got," he told me once.
From The Heavenly Twins by Grand, Madame Sarah
This night the actors came on the stage in more—or less—than ordinary dress; as men look when they have put on their dowdiest, for bad weather or dirty work: and these men wore their hats.
From Tired Church Members by Warner, Anna Bartlett
She glanced with almost maliciousness at Alice, who, in the dowdiest of pale-gray dresses, with her hair rather untidy and her face destitute of color, was standing near one of the windows.
From The Rebel of the School by Meade, L. T.
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.
