unadventurous

British  

/ ˌʌnədˈvɛntʃərəs /

adjective

1. not daring or enterprising

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Explanation

If you like to stay safe and hate taking risks, you're unadventurous. You prefer to keep your feet firmly on the ground while your fearless friends try bungee jumping or skydiving. Unadventurous people aren't interested in extreme sports or unfamiliar food or anything else that requires a degree of boldness and daring. You can also talk about unadventurous menus (featuring boring or familiar food) or unadventurous art at a gallery show (with pleasant, familiar works of art rather than innovative ones). Unadventurous adds the un- ("not") prefix to adventurous.

Example Sentences

This win and the much-improved first-half performance was still not enough to change their view, with a return to a more conservative and unadventurous display in the second half a cause for frustration.

From BBC • Jan. 20, 2026

Overall, with most paintings bland, unadventurous or ungainly, he just isn’t that good — perhaps unsurprising for a serious career that didn’t last much more than a decade.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 4, 2025

“Harry’s House” is pleasant and mild and distinctly unadventurous, calculated to occasionally titillate but never offend.

From Washington Post • May 23, 2022

To entice novice concertgoers, ECM isn’t falling back on the tried-and-true, under the assumption that a new listener is an unadventurous, easily frightened-off listener.

From Seattle Times • Mar. 23, 2022

But to make a mystery of the indolence of a rather timid, idle, and unadventurous scholar, who was blessed with more fastidiousness than passion, is absurd.

From The Art of Letters by Lynd, Robert

Related Words

• dependable
• prudent
• realistic
• reliable
• sure