rocky
1 Americanadjective
-
rockier,
comparative
-
rockiest
superlative
-
inclined or likely to rock; tottering; shaky; unsteady.
-
difficult or uncertain; full of hazards or obstacles.
a business with a rocky future.
-
physically unsteady or weak, as from sickness.
adjective
-
consisting of or abounding in rocks
a rocky shore
-
hard or unyielding
rocky determination
-
hard like rock
rocky muscles
adjective
-
weak, shaky, or unstable
-
informal (of a person) dizzy; sickly; nauseated
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of rocky1
First recorded in 1400–50; rock 1 + -y 1 ( def. )
Origin of rocky2
Explanation
Anything rocky is covered with rocks, like a rocky beach or hillside. You can also use rocky for something that moves in a bumpy or uneven manner, like a rocky ride in a Jeep. There's a figurative sense of rocky that means "difficult, rough, or up-and-down" like your rocky relationship with your sister or a struggling business's rocky future. This meaning comes from a combination of the "uneven and covered with rocks" definition and the verb rock, or "sway back and forth." The Rocky Mountains, which aren't actually all that rocky, were named for the local Native American people, called "the stone Sioux" by their Cree neighbors.
Vocabulary lists containing rocky
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:
It’s hard to find better musical evocations of rocky crags, ruined fortresses, or martial joie de combat than Mendelssohn’s.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 16, 2026
The controversy followed a rocky first appearance as White House press secretary on Tuesday, when Zacharia read extensively from prepared notes during a briefing lasting just 14 minutes.
From Barron's ● Oct. 14, 2026
Mattel’s other park ambitions have had rocky starts.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2026
Such impacts would be powerful enough to vaporize a substantial amount of rocky material.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 7, 2026
He put a hand on the rocky lip.
From Anya and the Nightingale by Sofiya Pasternack
They figured French politics wouldn’t get much rockier in the near term.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 3, 2026
While those early investors saw sizable paper gains when SpaceX went public, it’s been a rockier ride since then.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 17, 2026
Some systems could produce larger planets, rockier worlds, or perhaps more planets overall.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 1, 2026
But it’s been a rockier road than they had hoped.
From Salon ● Nov. 13, 2025
The land surrounding it was rockier than any other place we knew, and the path to it branched off underneath a massive fallen oak that looked somewhat like a mermaid.
From "The Season of Styx Malone" by Kekla Magoon
But in his third and rockiest year at the helm of the Trojans, Riley was still compensated like one of the kings of the sport.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 9, 2026
That is helping Weyerhaeuser ride out one of the rockiest periods for the forest-products industry in the past two decades.
From Barron's ● Dec. 16, 2025
Tennessee football hit the rockiest of bottoms in late January 2021.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 23, 2022
It was one of the rockiest starts for a wide release of Android yet, and hopefully, history doesn’t repeat itself with the Pixel 7 launch right around the corner.
From The Verge ● Sep. 6, 2022
It was gravelly near the water, rockiest at the lower end, and, from a mouse’s point of view, hilly.
From "Abel's Island" by William Steig
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
