weak

[ week ]

/ wik /

See synonyms for: weak / weaker / weakest on Thesaurus.com

adjective, weak·er, weak·est.

not strong; liable to yield, break, or collapse under pressure or strain; fragile; frail: a weak fortress; a weak spot in armor.

lacking in bodily strength or healthy vigor, as from age or sickness; feeble; infirm: a weak old man; weak eyes.

not having much political strength, governing power, or authority: a weak nation; a weak ruler.

lacking in force, potency, or efficacy; impotent, ineffectual, or inadequate: weak sunlight; a weak wind.

lacking in rhetorical or creative force or effectiveness: a weak reply to the charges; one of the author's weakest novels.

lacking in logical or legal force or soundness: a weak argument.

deficient in mental power, intelligence, or judgment: a weak mind.

not having much moral strength or firmness, resolution, or force of character: to prove weak under temptation; weak compliance.

deficient in amount, volume, loudness, intensity, etc.; faint; slight: a weak current of electricity; a weak pulse.

deficient, lacking, or poor in something specified: a hand weak in trumps; I'm weak in spelling.

deficient in the essential or usual properties or ingredients: weak tea.

unstressed, as a syllable, vowel, or word.

(of Germanic verbs) inflected with suffixes, without inherited change of the root vowel, as English work, worked, or having a preterit ending in a dental, as English bring, brought.

(of Germanic nouns and adjectives) inflected with endings originally appropriate to stems terminating in -n, as the adjective alte in German der alte Mann (“the old man”).

(of wheat or flour) having a low gluten content or having a poor quality of gluten.

Photography. thin; not dense.

Commerce. characterized by a decline in prices: The market was weak in the morning but rallied in the afternoon.

SYNONYMS FOR weak

1 breakable, delicate.

2 senile, sickly, unwell, invalid.

4 ineffective.

6 unsound, ineffective, inadequate, illogical, inconclusive, unsustained, unsatisfactory, lame, vague.

7 unintelligent, simple, foolish, stupid, senseless, silly.

8 vacillating, wavering, unstable, irresolute, fluctuating, undecided, weak-kneed.

9 slender, slim, inconsiderable, flimsy, poor, trifling, trivial.

11 wanting, short, lacking.

See synonyms for weak on Thesaurus.com

ANTONYMS FOR weak

1 strong.

See antonyms for weak on Thesaurus.com

QUIZZES

THIS PSAT VOCABULARY QUIZ IS PERFECT PRACTICE FOR THE REAL TEST

In our third teacher-created PSAT practice test there are new and unique vocabulary terms you may have never heard of! Can you guess what they mean?

Question 1 of 10

seclusion

a false belief or opinion.

the matter that settles to the bottom of a liquid.

the state of being isolated, kept apart, or withdrawn into solitude.

TAKE THE QUIZ TO FIND OUT

Origin of weak

First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English weik, from Old Norse veikr; cognate with Old English wāc,Dutch week,German weich; akin to Old English wīcan “to yield, give way,” Old Norse vīkja “to move, turn, draw back,” German weichen “to yield”

synonym study for weak

2. Weak, decrepit, feeble, weakly imply a lack of strength or of good health. Weak means not physically strong, because of extreme youth, old age, illness, etc.: weak after an attack of fever. Decrepit means old and broken in health to a marked degree: decrepit and barely able to walk. Feeble denotes much the same as weak, but connotes being pitiable or inferior: feeble and almost senile. Weakly suggests a long-standing sickly condition, a state of chronic bad health: A weakly child may become a strong adult.

OTHER WORDS FROM weak

o·ver·weak, adjectiveo·ver·weak·ly, adverbo·ver·weak·ness, noun

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2021

Example sentences from the Web for weak

I begged the doctors to save my children [as] I watched them grow weaker and weaker every day.
‘Her Survival Was a Miracle’: The 6-Year-Old Who Beat Ebola|Wade C.L. Williams|October 23, 2014|DAILY BEAST
Palmer takes some "bearing with," and, like us all, has his weaker side.
Will the Real Jim Palmer Please Stand Up|Tom Boswell|September 27, 2014|DAILY BEAST
Brother Patrick became weaker and weaker and others stop coming around as they pondered over their own status.
How Bureaucrats Let Ebola Spread to Nigeria|Michael Daly|August 14, 2014|DAILY BEAST
The older tribal power networks are weaker in a big city like Mosul.
With Friends Like These, ISIS Is Doomed|Jacob Siegel|July 24, 2014|DAILY BEAST

But the soldiers and police there were weaker than their numbers suggested.
The Paper Tiger of the Tigris: How ISIS Took Tikrit Without a Fight|Andrew Slater|June 29, 2014|DAILY BEAST
In this market, the wants of the weaker units, are just as important, as are those of the stronger.
Solaris Farm|Milan C. Edson
Of course, this could be wrong and there may be weaker channels we don't suspect.
The Flaming Mountain|Harold Leland Goodwin
And so there is a new or a newly apparent aggression upon the weaker race.
The Negro and the Nation|George S. Merriam
It was too evident, however, that his efforts were growing weaker and weaker.
Digby Heathcote|W.H.G. Kingston
And the more I thought about it, the weaker grew my confidence in the course I had pursued.
On the Lightship|Herman Knickerbocker Viel

British Dictionary definitions for weak

weak

/ (wiːk) /

adjective

lacking in physical or mental strength or force; frail or feeble

liable to yield, break, or give waya weak link in a chain

lacking in resolution or firmness of character

lacking strength, power, or intensitya weak voice

lacking strength in a particular parta team weak in defence

not functioning as well as normalweak eyes
easily upseta weak stomach

lacking in conviction, persuasiveness, etca weak argument

lacking in political or strategic strengtha weak state

lacking the usual, full, or desirable strength of flavourweak tea

grammar

denoting or belonging to a class of verbs, in certain languages including the Germanic languages, whose conjugation relies on inflectional endings rather than internal vowel gradation, as look, looks, looking, looked
belonging to any part-of-speech class, in any of various languages, whose inflections follow the more regular of two possible patternsCompare strong (def. 13)

(of a syllable) not accented or stressed

(of a fuel-air mixture) containing a relatively low proportion of fuelCompare rich (def. 13)

photog having low density or contrast; thin

(of an industry, market, currency, securities, etc) falling in price or characterized by falling prices

Derived forms of weak

weakish, adjectiveweakishly, adverbweakishness, noun

Word Origin for weak

Old English wāc soft, miserable; related to Old Saxon wēk, Old High German weih, Old Norse veikr

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Idioms and Phrases with weak

weak

In addition to the idioms beginning with weak

weak as a kitten
weak link
weak moment, in a

also see:

spirit is willing but the flesh is weak

MEANINGS

WORD GAMES

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WORD OF THE DAY

weak

adjective, weak·er, weak·est.

SYNONYMS FOR weak

ANTONYMS FOR weak

QUIZZES

THIS PSAT VOCABULARY QUIZ IS PERFECT PRACTICE FOR THE REAL TEST

Origin of weak

synonym study for weak

OTHER WORDS FROM weak

Example sentences from the Web for weak

British Dictionary definitions for weak

adjective

Derived forms of weak

Word Origin for weak

Idioms and Phrases with weak

MEANINGS

WORD GAMES

LEARN

WRITING

WORD OF THE DAY

weak

adjective, weak·er, weak·est.

SYNONYMS FOR weak

ANTONYMS FOR weak

QUIZZES

THIS PSAT VOCABULARY QUIZ IS PERFECT PRACTICE FOR THE REAL TEST

Origin of weak

synonym study for weak

OTHER WORDS FROM weak

Words related to weak

Example sentences from the Web for weak

British Dictionary definitions for weak

adjective

Derived forms of weak

Word Origin for weak

Idioms and Phrases with weak