adjective
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expressing or characterized by sorrow
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bringing or causing woe
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pitiful; miserable
a woeful standard of work
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of woeful
A Middle English word dating back to 1250–1300; see origin at woe, -ful
Explanation
Something woeful is full of sadness, like the woeful little boy who can't find the stuffed bunny he needs to fall asleep. Use the adjective woeful for people or things affected by misery or sorrow. A woeful expression on your face shows you're sad, and a woeful performance in the big kickball game means your team did so badly that you feel miserable about it. Woeful comes from woe, "great sorrow," and its source, the Old English interjection wa. This ancient woeful expression is still used in many languages today.
Vocabulary lists containing woeful
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
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Novel Study: Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, Chapters 1–6
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The Door in the Wall
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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.
Just ask the woeful New York Mets, MLB’s second-biggest spenders.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 13, 2026
The difference was clear in a woeful first set from Raducanu.
From BBC ● May 24, 2026
Hungary’s economy has barely grown in recent years, with a woeful 0.4% in real gross domestic product growth last year.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 14, 2026
However, the woeful defeat by Forest heightened Spurs' fears of suffering their first relegation from the top flight since 1977 and proved to be the final game of his brief spell.
From BBC ● Mar. 29, 2026
A young jockey named George Woolf, aboard for one of these woeful performances, summed up the colt’s mental state in four words: “mean, restive and ragged.”
From "Seabiscuit: An American Legend" by Laura Hillenbrand
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.
