grim
Americanadjective
-
stern and admitting of no appeasement or compromise.
grim determination; grim necessity.
- Synonyms:
- unyielding, harsh
- Antonyms:
- lenient
-
of a sinister or ghastly character.
a grim joke.
- Antonyms:
- attractive
-
having a harsh, surly, forbidding, or morbid air.
a grim man but a just one; a grim countenance.
- Antonyms:
- gentle
-
fierce, savage, or cruel.
War is a grim business.
-
unpleasant or repellant.
Scrubbing toilets is a grim task that no one likes doing.
adjective
-
stern; resolute
grim determination
-
harsh or formidable in manner or appearance
-
harshly ironic or sinister
grim laughter
-
cruel, severe, or ghastly
a grim accident
-
archaic fierce
a grim warrior
-
informal unpleasant; disagreeable
-
to hold very firmly or resolutely
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of grim
First recorded before 900; Middle English, Old English; cognate with Old Saxon, Old High German grimm, Old Norse grimmr
Explanation
Things that are gloomy, stark, ghastly, and somber are grim. Sunshine, puppies, and rainbows are not grim; zombies, reapers, and mummies are grim. Less scary things like drizzly, foggy days can also be called grim. Two famous uses of the adjective grim are the Grim Reaper and Grimm's Fairy Tales. Mr. Reaper shows up in movies and books wearing a long, hooded black cape and carrying a scythe, or long-handled blade used, in less grim circumstances, for mowing grass and reaping grain: he represents death. The real-life German brothers wrote some bone-chilling tales under their own name, Grimm, meaning "cruel, fierce," which is related to the English word grim. Modern grim things include crime-drama images of dead bodies and characters in horror movies.
Vocabulary lists containing grim
The SAT: Multiple-Meaning Words, List 4
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The New SAT: Multiple-Meaning Words
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More Negative Words to Describe a Person
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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:
Novels about country mice who move to the city are frequently grim tales of innocence lost.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 28, 2026
Despite the grim issues it tackled, the two-hour-10-minute play was appreciated for its pace and humour.
From BBC ● Jul. 9, 2026
Early in the film, De Palma establishes a base of references to grim incidents in American political history, from which he can work outward.
From Salon ● Jul. 4, 2026
"Current forecast tracks continue to indicate a grim outlook for the Marianas," the US National Weather Service warned.
From Barron's ● Jul. 3, 2026
His father’s face was grim; he didn’t seem like Fa anymore, ‘Some -demon -from the Otherworld -has entered it and made it evil.’
From "Wolf Brother" by Michelle Paver
Reports David has heard from clients in Cameroon are even grimmer: the IOM has refused to facilitate medical care for some detainees, the lawyer said.
From Barron's ● Jul. 7, 2026
It doesn’t even matter that Balogun’s red card for mashing a Bosnia and Herzegovina opponent’s leg was a bit much—an overreaction to a bang-bang play that looked grimmer in slow-motion.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 6, 2026
Hopefully the people who come to us for the light, fun, enjoyable take on Westeros will stick with us through some of the harder, trickier, grimmer moments.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 22, 2026
Other, grimmer recent headlines help to explain why.
From Slate ● Jun. 17, 2024
Large numbers of malignant tumors are discovered clinically in children under the age of five, but it is an even grimmer fact that significant numbers of such growths are present at or before birth.
From "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson
Despite the market’s record-setting pace, anxiety about the war in Iran has left Americans in the grimmest economic mood on record.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 24, 2026
Most of this year’s documentary nominees deal with the grimmest of tragedies, as in “All the Empty Rooms” and “Children No More: Were and Are Gone,” which address the remembrance of children brutally killed.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 20, 2026
But it is the reported conditions in detention which make the grimmest reading in the committee's conclusions, published today.
From BBC ● Nov. 28, 2025
Behind the scenes, his producers eagerly exploited the grimmest episodes of vulnerable people’s lives, never disabusing them of the false assumption that appearing on “Springer” would somehow help them.
From Salon ● Jan. 7, 2025
The grimmest examples of germs’ role in history come from the European conquest of the Americas that began with Columbus’s voyage of 1492.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
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.
