slowness
Americannoun
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the slow rate of movement of something; lack of speed or rapidity.
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lack of intelligence; poor ability to perceive, understand, realize, etc.; dullness.
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lack of activity or energy; the quality of not being busy; slackness.
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the quality of being unexciting or uninteresting; boring or draggy quality.
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the quality of being gradual, deliberate, or unhurried.
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the fact or state of falling behind the standard time, as of a clock.
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.
The company’s revised guidance was legitimately terrible, indicating that the slowness of the rollout surprised them as well, and will drag on.
From Barron's • May 4, 2026
The Soviet Union was heavily criticised for its slowness in revealing the scale of the disaster.
From BBC • Apr. 18, 2026
It’s a slowness she’d never had to confront, in a language she doesn’t speak.
From Slate • Feb. 1, 2026
Such tool use—notably hand letter-cutting in stone, producing forms like those we see on traditional monuments—stands for “materiality, for slowness, for permanence” in the face of boardroom brainstorming and assembly-line production.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 14, 2025
The music made him think of spaces without limits, of huge crystalline spheres which revolved with unutterable slowness through the vasty halls of the air.
From "Stardust" by Neil Gaiman
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.
