vast
Americanadjective
-
vaster,
comparative
-
vastest
superlative
-
of very great area or extent; immense.
the vast reaches of outer space.
- Synonyms:
- stupendous, colossal, gigantic, boundless, measureless
- Antonyms:
- small
-
of very great size or proportions; huge; enormous.
vast piles of rubble left in the wake of the war.
-
very great in number, quantity, amount, etc..
vast sums of money.
-
very great in degree, intensity, etc..
an artisan of vast skill.
noun
adjective
-
unusually large in size, extent, degree, or number; immense
-
(prenominal) (intensifier)
in vast haste
noun
-
poetic immense or boundless space
-
dialect a very great amount or number
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Adjectives
Etymology
Origin of vast
First recorded in 1565–75, from Latin vastus “empty, immense”
Explanation
If you’re in a boat out on the water and you can’t see any land, then the body of water you’re in is probably vast, or enormous. Things that are described as vast include oceans, seas, the heavens, deserts, and the surface of the moon. Even places that can't be seen or touched, like imaginations, are called vast, because of the endless ideas that come out of them. Someone with a vast imagination is very creative, and a place with a vast landscape is very large. Possibilities are vast, and so are the vocabularies of the world, filling vast volumes.
Vocabulary lists containing vast
Figurative Language in King's "I Have a Dream" Speech (1963)
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"The Ravine," Vocabulary from the short story
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Unit 1: Telling Details
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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.
See Examples For:
“There are these vast longitudinal dunes that are very much like the dunes in the Namib Desert.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 22, 2026
Even before the war, China was increasingly tapping in to its vast coal reserves to make oil, gasoline and other products.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 22, 2026
The vast majority of UAE trade with Iran consists in re-exports, according to official Emirati data, including everything from phones to meat and other foodstuffs.
From Barron's ● Aug. 20, 2026
For 16 years, it controlled the presidency - in the shape of Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru Musa Yar'Adua and then Goodluck Jonathan - and the vast majority of the country's 36 states.
From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026
Danny thought that the vast majority of the people in the industry were blinded by their interests and failed to see the risks they had created.
From "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis
The lands whose governance was at stake are vaster than any nation, and it’s possible the consequences of the vote will be felt for eons.
From Salon ● Aug. 19, 2024
But scientists like Philip Riris have taken a broader approach, looking for enduring patterns of human behavior on a vaster scale of time and space.
From New York Times ● May 1, 2024
In a flash of light, the universe had become an infinitely vaster and more interesting place.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 3, 2023
And while disposing treated water in the ocean is common practice for nuclear plants, critics have pointed out that the amount being released from Fukushima is on an unprecedented, far vaster scale.
From BBC ● Aug. 24, 2023
But then, this past September, Susan had transferred from the local school to the vaster, supposedly superior one in Garden City.
From "In Cold Blood" by Truman Capote
“Your handshake came over the vastest ocean in the world,” Zhou told Nixon as they rode to the guest quarters that Tuesday.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 20, 2022
But one of the vastest chasms might be cultural.
From New York Times ● Jan. 20, 2017
Baggage handling should be neither seen nor heard, though it’s the vastest operation of all.
From The New Yorker ● Feb. 1, 2016
Today, Ober owns several stores in a South Coast Plaza that is the vastest and most prosperous of all of Orange County’s many temples of shopping.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 17, 1990
The most living range of hills, surely, out of which the greatest life has spread, the vastest, perhaps, in the world.
From The Spirit of Rome by Vernon Lee
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.
