frighten
Americanverb (used with object)
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frightens,
present (3rd person singular)
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frightened,
past participle, past
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frightening
present participle
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to make afraid or fearful; throw into a fright; terrify; scare.
- Synonyms:
- intimidate, dismay, startle, shock
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to drive (usually followed by away, off, etc.) by scaring.
to frighten away pigeons from the roof.
verb (used without object)
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frightens,
present (3rd person singular)
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frightened,
past participle, past
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frightening
present participle
verb
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to cause fear in; terrify; scare
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to drive or force to go (away, off, out, in, etc) by making afraid
Synonym Usage
Frighten, alarm, scare, terrify, terrorize, appall all mean to arouse fear in people or animals. To frighten is to shock with sudden, startling, but usually short-lived fear, especially that arising from the apprehension of physical harm: to frighten someone by a sudden noise. To alarm is to arouse the feelings through the realization of some imminent or unexpected danger: to alarm someone by a scream. To scare is to frighten, often without the presence of real danger: Horror movies really scare me. To terrify is to strike with violent, overwhelming, or paralyzing fear: to terrify a city by lawless acts. To terrorize is to terrify in a general, continued, systematic manner, either wantonly or in order to gain control: His marauding armies terrorized the countryside. To appall is to overcome or confound by dread, dismay, shock, or horror: The suffering caused by the earthquake appalled him.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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frightenernoun
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overfrightenverb
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frightenableadjective
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frightenedadjective
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frighteningadjective
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nonfrighteningadjective
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unfrighteningadjective
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frighteninglyadverb
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nonfrighteninglyadverb
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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frightensimple
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frightenssimple
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have frightenedperfect
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has frightenedperfect
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am frighteningprogressive
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are frighteningprogressive
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is frighteningprogressive
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have been frighteningperfect progressive
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has been frighteningperfect progressive
Past
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frightenedsimple
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had frightenedperfect
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was frighteningprogressive
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were frighteningprogressive
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had been frighteningperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of frighten
Explanation
To frighten is to make someone feel afraid. Your new look — pink hair, tattoos, and piercings — will probably frighten your grandparents. If horror movies and haunted houses frighten you, they scare you, and all it might take to frighten your skittish cat is the sound of the vacuum cleaner or coffee grinder. Frighten is the verb form of the noun fright. although originally the verb was also fright. The Old English source is fyrhtu, "fear, dread, trembling, or horrible sight."
Vocabulary lists containing frighten
Unit 1, Academic Vocabulary
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Terrify
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Terrify
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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:
That should frighten audiences — all audiences, even those who only see a handful of movies theatrically in an entire year.
From Salon ● Sep. 2, 2026
First used by Ottoman military "mehter" bands to frighten and demoralise the enemy, cymbals were a useful tool for an empire on the warpath.
From Barron's ● Aug. 6, 2026
Wildlife experts say human-bear conflicts are the result of people moving deeper into the wildlands, and that bears that wander into neighborhoods are often harmless and easy to frighten.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 17, 2026
"Until yesterday, I never thought there would be something that would frighten me of going back to Liverpool after the break. Team-mates come and go but not like this," Salah posted last summer.
From BBC ● May 23, 2026
“Seen it? What do you mean? Hamlet, you frighten me.”
From "Ophelia" by Lisa Klein
I’m not here to persuade you to fly if it frightens you that much.
From MarketWatch ● Apr. 9, 2026
"What frightens myself and my husband is what I think has happened with Fairmont," she said.
From BBC ● Mar. 2, 2026
And that frightens Gen Z. This is a reason young people are attracted to videogames—the predictable safety of digital fantasy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 21, 2025
A sniff of a rotting old chair frightens Indy so much, he wets the rug.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 1, 2025
The Count’s mysterious warning frightened me at the time; it frightens me more now when I think of it, for in future he has a fearful hold upon me.
From "Dracula" by Bram Stoker
But despite the typos and inconsistencies in the emails, I understood how such an unsophisticated scam might actually be effective if the mark was sufficiently confused—or frightened.
From Slate ● Sep. 22, 2026
She lives close to the school and says she is frightened about Bechi being out of prison.
From BBC ● Sep. 20, 2026
That is precisely why the NFL, and not the frightened kid, should be the one to move first.
From Salon ● Sep. 9, 2026
His favorite musician is Prince, but when the book begins, he’s too frightened to buy the artist’s new album, “Lovesexy.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 25, 2026
Not only were we still frightened, but all of our clothes—everything we owned—was just gone!
From "Reaching for the Moon" by Katherine Johnson
Even more frightening are the claims made about how this information is gathered.
From Salon ● Sep. 21, 2026
The truly frightening thing, for a college football world that would like nothing more than to be rid of him, is that Kiffin is only getting started.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 6, 2026
He said the team had to avoid frightening the dog to ensure it was brought down to the ground safely during the rescue.
From BBC ● Sep. 4, 2026
That is more frightening than stupidity, which can at least be kept out of the meeting.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 31, 2026
This wasn’t just confusing and upsetting—it could be frightening, too.
From "A Thousand Sisters" by Elizabeth Wein
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.
