funny
1 Americanadjective
-
funnier,
comparative
-
funniest
superlative
-
providing fun; causing amusement or laughter; amusing; comical.
a funny remark;
a funny person.
-
attempting to amuse; facetious.
Did you really mean that or were you just being funny?
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warranting suspicion; deceitful; underhanded.
We thought there was something funny about those extra charges.
-
Informal. insolent; impertinent.
Don't get funny with me, young man!
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curious; strange; peculiar; odd.
Her speech has a funny twang.
noun
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funnies
plural
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Informal. a funny remark or story; a joke.
to make a funny.
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funnies,
-
Also called funny paper. the section of a newspaper reserved for comic strips, word games, etc.
noun
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funnies
plural
adjective
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causing amusement or laughter; humorous; comical
-
peculiar; odd
-
suspicious or dubious (esp in the phrase funny business )
-
informal faint or ill
to feel funny
noun
Usage
What is a basic definition of funny? Funny describes something that causes fun, especially laughter. Funny can describe someone who is trying to amuse others. It can also describe someone or something that is suspicious or odd. Funny has a few other senses as an adjective and a noun. Funny describes something that is amusing and causes people to laugh. Something that amuses people without causing laughter is usually said to be fun rather than funny. For example, a roller coaster would be called fun, while a knock-knock joke would be called funny. If something is not funny, it is unfunny. Real-life examples: Many people consider clowns, jokes, comedies, pranks, and Internet memes to be funny. These things cause most people to laugh. Used in a sentence: The comedian knew a lot of funny jokes. Funny also describes someone who is trying to get others to laugh or is trying to amuse them. This sense of funny is a synonym of facetious. Used in a sentence: Joan took the comment as an insult even though Luke was just trying to be funny. Funny also describes someone or something that is suspicious or underhanded. You might use this sense when you think something dishonest is going on. The phrase funny business is used in this sense to refer to criminal or unethical activity. Real-life examples: Rigged carnival games, overly friendly salespeople, and deals that seem too good to be true often cause people to think something funny is going on. Used in a sentence: We think something funny is going on at that store on the corner that is never open. Funny can also describe something that is strange, odd, or curious. Real-life examples: If your leg falls asleep, you will probably walk funny. Two tomatoes that grow together to make one tomato might have a funny shape. Used in a sentence: I think the speakers might be broken because the music sounds funny.
Synonym Usage
Funny, laughable, ludicrous refer to that which excites laughter. Funny and laughable are both applied to that which provokes laughter or deserves to be laughed at; funny is a colloquial term loosely applied and in popular use is commonly interchangeable with the other terms: a funny story, scene, joke; a laughable incident, mistake. That which is ludicrous excites laughter by its incongruity and foolish absurdity: The monkey's attempts to imitate the woman were ludicrous.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of funny1
First recorded in 1730–40; fun + -y 1
Origin of funny2
First recorded in 1780–90; perhaps jocular use of funny 1
Explanation
Something that is funny is amusing or comical. Comedians make their living being funny. It seems like the adjective funny should describe something fun — but it doesn’t always. A fun rollercoaster ride might make you scream instead of laugh. In fact, funny is also used in the sense of something that is fishy or shady, or just a little odd, like a funny feeling, or a person who seems a little funny, meaning weird. So if someone calls you funny, make sure they are smiling before you thank them for the compliment.
Vocabulary lists containing funny
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:
Sarandon, who played the heroine Janet Weiss in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, praised Curry as "a funny, sexy, original".
From BBC ● Aug. 27, 2026
The result was a 23-minute-long heartfelt video that was so funny at times that I couldn’t breathe from laughing so hard.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 26, 2026
In an interview on Monday, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer played down the language issue in the trade talks as a "funny fake story."
From Barron's ● Aug. 24, 2026
He covers topics in the zeitgeist related to wellness, cultural etiquette, masculinity and lifestyle/style trends—basically all the weird, funny, inspired and horrifying things being thrown at us in this moment of "maxxing."
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 24, 2026
It’s funny the way I remember my time in France: little vignettes, discombobulated, a narrative drifting along an ocean, a series of scenes that meant nothing until they meant something.
From "The Brightwood Code" by Monica Hesse
A recent spate of theatrical funnies is trying to change that.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2025
Did these two never read the funnies growing up?
From Salon ● Aug. 16, 2024
It’s a little like TikTok but specifically for Netflix funnies.
From The Verge ● Oct. 4, 2021
“I loved the funnies — the Mickey Mouse, the Donald Duck cars,” he told the Orange County Register in 2014.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 25, 2021
“I’m thinking this paper is full of bad news. I’m thinking of flipping to the funnies for a change.”
From "The Season of Styx Malone" by Kekla Magoon
There’s nothing funnier to me than a confident moron.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 6, 2026
Elsewhere in his interview, McSweeney said he found Donald Trump "much funnier than I expected him to be".
From BBC ● Jul. 2, 2026
Jokes about Twitch streamers getting paid to do nothing were funnier the first 1,000 times you saw them somewhere, and even then, they weren’t worth more than a passing snicker.
From Salon ● Jun. 11, 2026
His next few releases would see his music becoming clearer sonically, as if that smoke ring had dissipated, as well as funnier and more self-referential.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 2, 2026
It got funnier and funnier, so we finally had to stop singing around Middletown because I thought that Mrs. Windermere was going to drive off the road, that’s how hard she was laughing.
From "Okay for Now" by Gary D. Schmidt
And one of Slate’s funniest writers, Christina Cauterucci, took a deep dive into the weirdly knife-heavy videos the Trump administration has been posting on TikTok, so you don’t have to.
From Slate ● Jul. 30, 2026
He did this by causing one of the weirdest and funniest political scandals of the modern era.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 29, 2026
The funniest part of that conversation is when Sam labels Judith a WOACA, a Woman of a Certain Age, pronouncing it as if he were Fozzie Bear punctuating a joke in an old-timey stand-up set.
From Salon ● Jul. 26, 2026
Freeman said: "I've never laughed that much at work, before or since. It's easily the funniest time I've ever had."
From BBC ● Jul. 9, 2026
“My! But you say the funniest things,” she giggled.
From "Native Son" by Richard Wright
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.
