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• hard-pressed
  hard-pressed

  adjective

  heavily burdened or oppressed, as by overwork or financial difficulties; harried; put-upon.
• hard pressed
  hard pressed

  Overburdened, put upon, as in With all these bills to pay we find ourselves hard pressed. [c. 1800]

hard-pressed

American  

[hahrd-prest] / ˈhɑrdˈprɛst /

Or hardpressed

adjective

1. heavily burdened or oppressed, as by overwork or financial difficulties; harried; put-upon.

   Synonyms:

   beleaguered

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hard-pressed British  

adjective

1. in difficulties

   the swimmer was hard-pressed

2. subject to severe competition

3. subject to severe attack

4. closely pursued

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hard pressed Idioms  

1. Overburdened, put upon, as in With all these bills to pay we find ourselves hard pressed. [c. 1800]

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Etymology

Origin of hard-pressed

First recorded in 1815–25

Example Sentences

That’s especially useful during a global event like the World Cup—when even the most devoted soccer fan is hard-pressed to keep track of every group-stage result, knockout permutation, and concurring match windows.

From Slate • Jun. 10, 2026

Despite piling additional pressure on already hard-pressed Americans, the latest GDP figures out this week showed the economy motoring along in the first three months of 2026.

From BBC • May 2, 2026

“If you do that today, you’re hard-pressed to find a great book that’s 500 to 600 pages long.”

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 28, 2026

I’m hard-pressed to think of any movie I’d watch four times in a month if I didn’t genuinely admire it on some level.

From Salon • Apr. 5, 2026

Unlike the Box at Coxsackie, which had seemed a true solitary confinement, with inmates hard-pressed to communicate with each other through solid-steel doors with Lexan windows, the cells here were barred.

From "Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing" by Ted Conover