weighty
Americanadjective
-
having considerable weight; heavy; ponderous.
a weighty bundle.
- Antonyms:
- light
-
burdensome or troublesome.
the weightier cares of sovereignty.
-
important or momentous.
weighty negotiations.
- Synonyms:
- consequential, grave, serious, significant
- Antonyms:
- unimportant, light
-
having or exerting influence, power, etc.; influential.
a weighty merchant of Boston.
adjective
-
having great weight
-
important or momentous
-
causing anxiety or worry
Synonym Usage
See heavy.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of weighty
Explanation
Weighty things are either very heavy or extremely important and worrisome. Putting your weighty cat on a diet might be a weighty issue that nags at you. If your luggage is too weighty, you'll have to pay an extra fee at the airport. And if you've got a mind full of weighty problems, you won't be able to fall asleep on your long flight. Sometimes this adjective is also used to mean "influential," like the weighty influence your SAT scores might have on your chances of being accepted at a competitive college.
Vocabulary lists containing weighty
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:
But even then, the film feels energized by its bold mixture of pulp pleasures and weighty musings, operating with a bruising efficiency that Ali’s skilled assassin would no doubt respect.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 25, 2026
Picking a major has long been a weighty decision for college students, but the financial stakes appear to be getting higher in the AI era, according to economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 25, 2026
The documentary powerfully captures the apocalyptic landscape of Gaza City, its streets reduced to rubble and mangled rebar, and the weighty sense of responsibility shouldered by the few remaining journalists on the ground.
From Barron's ● Sep. 6, 2026
The weighty compliance burden helps explain why Head Start’s price tag has jumped even as enrollment shrinks.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 4, 2026
When he replied, his words were weighty and spoken with a grim resolve.
From "Ophelia" by Lisa Klein
A couple of the disputes are a bit weightier than a question of whether someone’s yard goes to here . . . or to here.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 12, 2026
The couple are set to return to the presidential residence, but this time Mutharika's in-tray will be far weightier.
From BBC ● Sep. 24, 2025
Luggage in the first half of the 20th century was much weightier and bulkier, designed for people with the means to have helpers carry their luggage for them.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 21, 2025
He argued that some of the removals might stand a court test as the case progresses, noting that some of the books dealt more with “juvenile, flatulent humor” than weightier subjects.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 6, 2024
I wasn’t going anywhere until morning, at least, and I wanted to enjoy a few more minutes with my friends unburdened by weightier things.
From "Hollow City" by Ransom Riggs
The city's historically lucrative wholesale and retail trade remains one of its weightiest sectors, accounting for almost 25 percent of GDP in the first nine months of 2024.
From Barron's ● Mar. 1, 2026
For nearly 500 years the Court of Session has considered the thorniest and weightiest matters of the moment.
From BBC ● Sep. 19, 2023
Opinionpalooza, aka June, aka the end of the Supreme Court term, when the year’s weightiest opinions tend to come out.
From Slate ● Jun. 1, 2023
Admittedly, the lawsuit — essentially, a dispute among insurers over the bill for all that cracked fiberglass and teak — won’t be the weightiest matter heard in federal court in Seattle.
From Seattle Times ● May 28, 2023
But whose side will be weightiest in a direct encounter?
From With Fire and Sword An Historical Novel of Poland and Russia. by Henryk Sienkiewicz
Random Word
Spin the wheel and learn a new word!
Get a wordDefinitions 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.
