eagerness

American  

[ee-ger-nis] / ˈi gər nɪs /

noun

1. in an earnest, ardent, or eager way; keenness.

   The professor’s love for the topic, and her eagerness to share it with others, comes across in every word of every lecture.

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Etymology

Origin of eagerness

eager ( def. ) + -ness ( def. )

Explanation

Eagerness is a characteristic of being excited and prepared to do something. Shooting your hand in the air and shouting, "Me! Me!" when your teacher asks for a volunteer is a good way to show your eagerness. A basketball team displays its eagerness by running onto the court at the start of the game, and a puppy's eagerness to lick your face and nibble your fingers is either the cutest thing about it, or one of the many reasons you don't like puppies. Eagerness and eager are both positive words, but in the thirteenth century eager meant "fierce or angry," and it shares a Latin root with the sour word acrid, or "bitter."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

eagerness

“But the yearning for Ashura, the eagerness, the tears in people’s eyes; that has doubled, because people are living Karbala in their lives.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 22, 2026

But you can still discern the same rush, the same eagerness to assume that everything is going to turn out great without taking many steps to make sure that it does.

From Slate ● Jun. 4, 2026

The market timers’ eagerness to instead believe that the worst is over is more reminiscent of the “slope of hope” that markets slide down.

From MarketWatch ● Apr. 9, 2026

“Children’s eagerness to eat was a cross-class phenomenon then,” she relates, “just as pickiness is a cross-class phenomenon now.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 20, 2026

Now she was bouncing with eagerness to drop them in the post.

From "The Hidden Gallery" by Maryrose Wood

Related Words

• ambition
• ardor
• excitement
• fervor
• hunger
• impatience
• keenness
• longing
• thirst
• yearning
• zeal