unambitious
Britishadjective
Explanation
Someone who is unambitious isn't particularly motivated to achieve some kind of success. Do you prefer lying on the couch to doing extra credit? When it comes to school, you're unambitious. An ambitious person has an obvious interest in succeeding at something. If you're determined to climb Mt. Everest, and you train hard in preparation, you're ambitious. If you're not particularly motivated about that or anything else, you're unambitious. Ambitious comes from the Latin ambitiosus, "eager for public office" or "eager for favor." Add the prefix un-, meaning "not," and you get unambitious.
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 German gearbox maker’s implied fourth quarter feels relatively unambitious, they add.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 13, 2025
That too is considered an achievable and unambitious pledge given recent forecasts already project that figure will hit 36 percent in a decade.
From Barron's • Nov. 4, 2025
That more or less sums up this movie, a horror flick that’s serviceable enough to make you occasionally giggle or flinch, yet is also so aggressively unambitious that it scarcely seems worth griping about.
From New York Times • Apr. 18, 2024
The postseason was a different story, though, with the Dodgers’ annual shortcomings in the fall increasingly blamed on their unambitious moves the previous winter.
From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 8, 2022
After dessert, Milton took a handkerchief out of his back pocket, unscrewed the hot lightbulb, and, tossing it like an unambitious juggler, conveyed it into the living room.
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
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.
