levity
Americannoun
-
lightness of mind, character, or behavior; lack of appropriate seriousness or earnestness.
- Synonyms:
- giddiness, triviality, flippancy, frivolity
-
an instance or exhibition of this.
- Synonyms:
- giddiness, triviality, flippancy, frivolity
-
lightness in weight.
noun
-
inappropriate lack of seriousness
-
fickleness or instability
-
archaic lightness in weight
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of levity
1555–65; < Latin levitās lightness, frivolity, equivalent to levi ( s ) light + -tās -ty 2
Explanation
Joking that your dead grandmother "never looked better" could inject some levity, or frivolity, into her funeral, but your relatives might find your joke inappropriate to the occasion. Levity literally means "lightness," and it's often an attempt to inject some lightness or humor into an otherwise somber situation. Telling your Aunt Edna a joke while she recuperates from a skiing accident could provide the levity needed to brighten her mood. Yet levity is often used to describe humor that's not appropriate to the occasion, like telling jokes during a funeral.
Vocabulary lists containing levity
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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Grade 12, List 1
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The Hunger Games
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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:
In our dire age, a little bit of levity can often feel like a wager, staking your bets on an audience’s bandwidth for fun.
From Salon ● Jun. 10, 2026
"No matter how difficult times are, I believe that humans always manage to find flickers of levity and deep wells of love," she said.
From BBC ● May 19, 2026
There are scattered moments of levity on “The Great Divide,” but one can’t help but wish for a few more.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 28, 2026
I wanted to interject some levity, because the work can get so dark.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 17, 2026
Beowulf scanned the hall for signs of levity.
From "The Interrupted Tale" by Maryrose Wood
Before him no monkey-tricks, no apish indecorums—none even of those passing levities which young gorillas will indulge in just like other youths.
From Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General by Lever, Charles James
It was so sure to be one of those frivolous little levities which jar so painfully on serious feelings.
From The Bramleighs of Bishop's Folly by Lever, Charles James
Here and there are apt indications of his proneness to those vicious levities and debasing luxuries which afterwards ripened into such a gigantic profligacy.
From The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Cæsar by Black, Ebenezer Charlton
"Are the mere levities with which I amused an hour to be recorded against me as principles?"
From A Rent In A Cloud by Lever, Charles James
This time twelvemonth, for example, you, my dear doctor, may be a bishop, and not over inclined to these harmless levities.
From Sir Brook Fossbrooke, Volume I. by Lever, Charles James
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.
