merry
adjective
full of cheerfulness or gaiety; joyous in disposition or spirit.
merry
1 American
[mer-ee]
/ ˈmɛr i /
adjective
-
merrier,
comparative
-
merriest
superlative
-
full of cheerfulness or gaiety; joyous in disposition or spirit.
a merry little man.
- Synonyms:
- glad, cheery, frolicsome, blithesome, blithe, happy
- Antonyms:
- sad
-
laughingly happy; mirthful; festively joyous; hilarious.
a merry time at the party.
- Antonyms:
- solemn
-
Archaic. causing happiness; pleasant; delightful.
idioms
Merry
2
American
[mer-ee]
/ ˈmɛr i /
noun
merry
British
/ ˈmɛrɪ /
adjective
-
cheerful; jolly
-
very funny; hilarious
-
informal slightly drunk
-
archaic delightful
-
to revel; be festive
-
informal to disturb greatly; disrupt
Pronunciation
See Mary.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
-
merrinessnoun
-
overmerrinessnoun
-
overmerryadjective
-
unmerryadjective
-
merrilyadverb
-
overmerrilyadverb
-
unmerrilyadverb
Inflected Forms
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of merry
First recorded before 900; Middle English meri(e),myrie, murie, Old English myr(i)ge, mer(i)ge “pleasant, delightful”
Explanation
To be merry is to be happy, especially in a fun, festive way. Parties and celebrations are merry, and so are the fun people who attend them. This old fashioned word for “happy” is popular in December when people say, “Merry Christmas.” To be merry is to be happy, jaunty, and ready to frolic. A group of people laughing as they walk down the street is a merry gang. Anything merry is festive, often involving games, celebrations, and parties. A merry-go-round makes kids happy as it spins them around. Smiling and laughing are signs of being merry. If you go along your merry way, you walk away happily, maybe even skipping.
Vocabulary lists containing merry
Joy To The Word: Christmas Terms
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"The Moustache" and "Who We Really Are"
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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:
Sign Off: Now go forth and be merry!
From Slate ● Aug. 21, 2026
His group of merry men held meetups at coffee shops, beer halls and the zoo, hosted holiday hootenannies and even offered CPR classes.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 19, 2026
Don’t conflate Fama and his merry band of economists at the business school with the Chicago School of Economics, practitioners in the university’s economics department led by another Nobel laureate, Milton Friedman.
From Barron's ● Jun. 18, 2026
Bruno Fernandes has had an outstanding season for United, and Liverpool will need to stop the Portuguese Pied Piper from leading them a merry dance.
From BBC ● Apr. 30, 2026
‘Come! Let us go on! The thought of those merry young folk driven like cattle burns my heart.’
From "The Two Towers" by J. R. R. Tolkien
“The Merry Wives of Windsor Cove,” a musical adaptation of Shakespeare’s “The Merry Wives of Windsor” at UC Irvine’s New Swan Shakespeare Festival, relocates the comedy to a Southern California beach town in the 1950s.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 23, 2026
Merry, Faye’s editor, dreads breaking the news about Faye’s latest manuscript: “How do you tell her that her 15th book . . . is unsalvageable?”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 1, 2026
"My life is a broken roller coaster, but maybe I'm the only one to blame," they sing on the melancholy Merry Go Round.
From BBC ● Mar. 20, 2026
Activists had placed a beam in the water early on December 25 to partially recreate the wave, according to German media reports, and hung a banner above the water that read "Merry Christmas".
From Barron's ● Dec. 28, 2025
Merry and Pippin sat beside him on pillows of grass.
From "The Two Towers" by J. R. R. Tolkien
Basically, the more stocks that are participating in the rally, the merrier.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 9, 2026
There was no merrier illustration of the varieties of human experience than this runaway French hit, which was, like “Don Quixote,” translated into English by Smollett in 1748.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 9, 2026
"I just thought to myself, the more the merrier," she says.
From BBC ● Dec. 24, 2025
The more the merrier is especially true during the holiday season.
From Barron's ● Dec. 15, 2025
That morning they lit a fire in a deep hollow shrouded by great bushes of holly, and their supper-breakfast was merrier than it had been since they set out.
From "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien
It’s the merriest time of the year — and arguably when the resort is at its glistening, glowing best with seasonal food offerings, holiday ride makeovers and unique live entertainment options.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 19, 2025
While each piece features rotating focal points, they all tie together with a beautiful gold scroll border, working to create the merriest tablescape of all.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 17, 2021
It was here and now it is gone, the merriest, brightest, and most thankful Christmas the world has ever known.
From Slate ● Dec. 21, 2020
“Suddenly the merriest of the harlequins felt a chill in his legs, took off his mask, and to the amazement of all revealed a violet-blue face,” wrote Heine.
From New York Times ● Apr. 8, 2020
Since I’d been helping out stitching the detectives’ costumes, I’d become friendly with a few of the agents, and Mr. Webster was the merriest.
From "The Detective's Assistant" by Kate Hannigan
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.
