noun
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the state or quality of being mediocre
-
a mediocre person or thing
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of mediocrity
First recorded in 1400–50; late Middle English mediocrite, from Middle French mediocrite, from Latin mediocritāt-, stem of mediocritās “middle state, moderation”; equivalent to mediocre + -ity
Compare meaning
How does mediocrity compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
The noun mediocrity means the quality of being average or ordinary. You can't be great at everything — in some areas, we all fall into mediocrity. Mediocrity, pronounced "me-dee-AH-crih-tee," has Latin parts that together literally mean "halfway up the mountain." You can see how it still applies — in climbing the mountain — or ladder — of success, mediocrity is in the middle, neither leading the pack nor sprawling on ground, giving up. Such of person of this middle-level of success can also be called a mediocrity. That's a second definition of the word.
Vocabulary lists containing mediocrity
A Word's-Eye View of Presidential Candidates in 2016: Campaign Announcements
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The Fire Next Time
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Neil Simon (1927 - 2018) Tribute List
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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:
What a shame, considering a three-dimensional approach might be all “Obsession” needs to skate past mediocrity.
From Salon ● Jun. 4, 2026
Compare them to the Kings, who are old, slow and quickly fading into mediocrity.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 16, 2026
Kicking and screaming, they won matches they looked like they weren't going to win, dug out key goals in the dying seconds, triumphed over their own mediocrity at times, driven on by Martin O'Neill.
From BBC ● May 16, 2026
And even though the women won a championship in 1978, under the women’s-only AIAW, it soon fell into decades of unfamiliar Bruins mediocrity.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 5, 2026
You were not expected to aspire to excellence: you were expected to make peace with mediocrity.
From "The Fire Next Time" by James Baldwin
But they were also politicians, self-serving and ambitious, often well-born mediocrities flying high above their general level of talent.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 30, 2022
Marcel will come to a similar conclusion at the end of the novel, seeing the aristocratic elites who dazzled him in his youth as mediocrities, elevated to the status of demigods by his imagination.
From Salon ● Dec. 4, 2022
That doesn’t describe the modern NFL, however, where teams seem to be constantly installing and discarding proven mediocrities.
From The Guardian ● Dec. 16, 2019
And Vargas Llosa has published so many novels — 18 in all — that the tours de force can get lost among the mediocrities.
From New York Times ● Feb. 20, 2018
It’s why picking the right candidate for a job is so difficult and why, on more occasions than we may care to admit, utter mediocrities sometimes end up in positions of enormous responsibility.
From "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell
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.
