sloth
Americannoun
-
habitual disinclination to exertion; laziness; indolence.
Indifference, negligence, and sloth have no place in the classroom.
- Synonyms:
- idleness
-
any of several slow-moving, arboreal, tropical American edentates of the family Bradypodidae, having a long, coarse, grayish-brown coat often of a greenish cast caused by algae, and long, hooklike claws used in gripping tree branches while hanging or moving along in a habitual upside-down position.
-
a pack or group of bears.
noun
-
any of several shaggy-coated arboreal edentate mammals of the family Bradypodidae, esp Bradypus tridactylus ( three-toed sloth or ai ) or Choloepus didactylus ( two-toed sloth or unau ), of Central and South America. They are slow-moving, hanging upside down by their long arms and feeding on vegetation
-
reluctance to work or exert oneself
Etymology
Origin of sloth
First recorded in 1125–75; Middle English slowth; replacing Old English slǣwth, derivative of slǣw, variant of slāw “slow”; see slow, -th 1
Explanation
If you lounge around in your bathrobe watching TV and ordering out for pizza, you'll get called a sloth. A sloth is actually a slow-moving, tree-dwelling mammal, but it has become a synonym for "lazybones." Slug also doubles as the name of an animal and a term for someone who is lazy, slow or lethargic. But with slug, the animal name probably morphed into the human application, whereas sloth has meant "lazy person" or "laziness" for a long time. In the Catholic Church sloth was categorized as one of the seven deadly sins.
Vocabulary lists containing sloth
The Lazy, Hazy Days of Summer
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Amazing Animals, List 1
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My Brother Sam is Dead
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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.
Sloth World is advertised as Orlando's only "slotharium," with a rainforest-inspired habitat "designed exclusively with sloth well-being in mind", according to its website.
From BBC • Apr. 24, 2026
"The truth is, we lost sloths that had a virus of which showed barely any symptoms and was undetectable even after necropsy," Ben Agresta, the owner of Sloth World, told Fox-35 in Orlando.
From BBC • Apr. 24, 2026
Dr. Rebecca Cliffe was working on her Ph.D. near San Clemente at the Sloth Sanctuary of Costa Rica when she first began noticing sloths with misshapen limbs, missing appendages and albinism.
From Salon • Mar. 2, 2024
Wild Republic Snuggleluvs Sloth Snuggleluvs’ oversized, weighted plush comforts and eases anxiety the way a weighted blanket does, and is just the right size for snuggling.
From Seattle Times • Nov. 16, 2023
Probably, though, Sloth wouldn’t say anything about him at all.
From "Ship Breaker" by Paolo Bacigalupi
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.
