remedy
Americannoun
-
remedies
plural
-
something that cures or relieves a disease or bodily disorder; a healing medicine, application, or treatment.
- Synonyms:
- medication, medicament, specific, restorative, cure
-
something that corrects or removes an evil of any kind.
- Synonyms:
- antidote, corrective
-
Law. legal redress; the legal means of enforcing a right or redressing a wrong.
-
Coining. a certain allowance at the mint for deviation from the standard weight and fineness of coins; tolerance.
verb (used with object)
-
remedies,
present (3rd person singular)
-
remedied,
past participle, past
-
remedying
present participle
noun
-
any drug or agent that cures a disease or controls its symptoms
-
anything that serves to put a fault to rights, cure defects, improve conditions, etc
a remedy for industrial disputes
-
the legally permitted variation from the standard weight or quality of coins; tolerance
verb
-
to relieve or cure (a disease, illness, etc) by or as if by a remedy
-
to put to rights (a fault, error, etc); correct
Synonym Usage
See cure.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
remedysimple
-
remediessimple
-
have remediedperfect
-
has remediedperfect
-
am remedyingprogressive
-
are remedyingprogressive
-
is remedyingprogressive
-
have been remedyingperfect progressive
-
has been remedyingperfect progressive
Past
-
remediedsimple
-
had remediedperfect
-
was remedyingprogressive
-
were remedyingprogressive
-
had been remedyingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of remedy
First recorded in 1175–1225; (for the noun) Middle English remedie, from Anglo-French, from Latin remedium, from re- re- + med(ērī) “to heal” ( cf. medical) + -ium -ium; (for the verb) late Middle English remedien, from Middle French remedier, from Latin remediāre, derivative of remedium
Explanation
A remedy is something that relieves or cures a problem or illness. Aloe vera is a common remedy for sunburn. If you're having trouble sleeping, the first remedy you might try is a hot bath and a cup of chamomile tea. If that doesn't help, you may resort to something stronger, like a sedative. If a streetlight shining in your window is part of the problem, you can remedy the situation with some room-darkening shades. But if it's your upstairs neighbors and their all-night partying that's keeping you awake, you may have to consider a legal remedy.
Vocabulary lists containing remedy
Vocabulary from Beyoncé's "Lemonade"
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"Romeo and Juliet" by William Shakespeare, Act IV
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"The Hunger Games" Vocabulary from Chapter 1
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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:
There is no constitutional duty to unlimber the remedy if it will not solve, or at least help solve, the problem.
From Slate ● Aug. 17, 2026
Trump is especially interested in Section 301, which is meant to remedy foreign trade practices that are discriminatory, unfair or unreasonable, and that burden U.S. commerce.
From Salon ● Aug. 16, 2026
He was also wrong to present vitamin C as a near-universal remedy for many illnesses.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 7, 2026
The AI company hasn’t committed to Hugging Face’s proposed remedy: that OpenAI release a full log of the rogue agents’ actions and commit $100 million of compute for the platform’s community to build cyber defenses.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 4, 2026
"Pale white skin turns gray faster, can you remedy that?"
From "The Belles" by Dhonielle Clayton
Vitamin C was filed away with other “alternative” remedies, and Pauling’s late-career crusade was widely seen as a sad mistake.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 7, 2026
“We take copyright infringement seriously and will pursue all appropriate remedies to protect our content and intellectual property rights.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 26, 2026
Employees must first exhaust their administrative remedies at an agency that cannot decide their case.
From Slate ● Jul. 13, 2026
A further trial is also scheduled for October this year to determine the consequences of any actionable breaches and any issues relating to damages or other remedies.
From BBC ● Jul. 10, 2026
The science of medicine at the end of the eighteenth century still relied a great deal on ancient myths and folk remedies.
From "An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793" by Jim Murphy
The resulting racing inefficiencies can be remedied with market designs that slow the pace of trading, but more accurate clocks will not solve the underlying problem.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 8, 2026
He said on Friday that the "algae is 75% gone, and the condition will soon be completely remedied".
From BBC ● Jun. 21, 2026
Every single person in that room revealed that they had dense breasts, which we thought could be remedied somehow through self-massage.
From Slate ● Feb. 4, 2026
In its ruling, it noted initial "shortcomings" in the environmental impact assessment decision-making process, but said they were remedied within enough time not to affect that right.
From Barron's ● Oct. 28, 2025
The act remedied this insanity to some extent; it provides an “innocent owner” defense to those whose property has been seized.
From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander
The resolution also emphasised that reparation claims "represent a concrete step towards remedying historical wrongs against Africans and people of African descent".
From BBC ● Apr. 7, 2026
The iOS 26.4 update improved keyboard accuracy by remedying the ghost-letter problem, but autocorrect issues persist.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 29, 2026
It’s the easy way out — and remedying wrongs is never easy.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 24, 2026
“This has been one of the holy grails of remedying the Korean discount, and there’s at least a 50-50 chance of it passing this year,” he says.
From Barron's ● Dec. 31, 2025
Fizz is prone to remedying me and would invariably seek the answer to my “problem.”
From "Saints and Misfits" by S.K. Ali
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.
