tenderness
Americannoun
Explanation
Tenderness is a feeling of concern, gentle affection, or warmth. It's the quality of a person who cries when they see someone get hurt or who gently picks up a tiny kitten. Writing a heartfelt note to a sad friend is one way to show tenderness, and so is giving your brother a sincere hug on his birthday. Another definition of this adjective is "extreme sensitivity to pain." You might experience tenderness in your muscles the day after going on a long hike. This is actually the original meaning, from tender, "soft or easily injured," and a root meaning "stretched, thin, or weak."
Vocabulary lists containing tenderness
Novel Study: The Crucible, Acts 3–4
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Crenshaw
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The Suffix -ness, Part 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.
The palace added: "With her childlike perspective, her irony, her tenderness, and her inner demons, the author created a deeply moving world with which readers identified."
From BBC ● Jun. 4, 2026
The 99-year-old artist—long excluded from the mainstream, male-dominated art scene in Mexico, and who only had her first major retrospective last year—is a quiet yet forceful fount of tenderness.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 14, 2026
“I knew kids like Jack on the playground. But the more I read it, the more I felt there was a tenderness that Golding was looking for in Jack.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 4, 2026
It adds moisture, tenderness, and just enough tang to make things interesting.
From Salon ● Apr. 28, 2026
A great tenderness for her mother came into Francie’s heart.
From "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" by Betty Smith
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.
