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⇱ weak - WordReference.com Dictionary of English

weak

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UK:**UK and possibly other pronunciationsUK and possibly other pronunciations/ˈwiːk/US:USA pronunciation: IPA and respellingUSA pronunciation: IPA/wik/ ,USA pronunciation: respelling(wēk)

Inflections of 'weak' (adj):
weaker
adj comparative
weakest
adj superlative

WordReference Random House Learner's Dictionary of American English © 2026
weak /wik/USA pronunciation   adj., -er, -est. 
  1. liable to give way under pressure or strain:The walls are too weak to support the house.
  2. lacking in strength or vigor;
    feeble:He's weak from hunger.
  3. lacking in force, intensity, or ability to produce an effect:a weak president.
  4. lacking in logical or legal force:a weak argument.
  5. low in intelligence, ability, or skill:a weak mind; a weak speller.
  6. lacking in moral strength or force of character:too weak to resist temptation.
  7. not great in amount, volume, intensity, etc., or in a characteristic property or essential ingredient:a weak electrical current; a weak pulse.
  8. Businessshowing a decline in prices:a weak stock market.
weak•ly, adv. 

WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2026
weak  (wēk),USA pronunciation adj., -er, -est. 
  1. not strong;
    liable to yield, break, or collapse under pressure or strain;
    fragile;
    frail:a weak fortress; a weak spot in armor.
  2. lacking in bodily strength or healthy vigor, as from age or sickness;
    feeble;
    infirm:a weak old man; weak eyes.
  3. not having much political strength, governing power, or authority:a weak nation; a weak ruler.
  4. lacking in force, potency, or efficacy;
    impotent, ineffectual, or inadequate:weak sunlight; a weak wind.
  5. lacking in rhetorical or creative force or effectiveness:a weak reply to the charges; one of the author's weakest novels.
  6. lacking in logical or legal force or soundness:a weak argument.
  7. deficient in mental power, intelligence, or judgment:a weak mind.
  8. not having much moral strength or firmness, resolution, or force of character:to prove weak under temptation; weak compliance.
  9. deficient in amount, volume, loudness, intensity, etc.;
    faint;
    slight:a weak current of electricity; a weak pulse.
  10. deficient, lacking, or poor in something specified:a hand weak in trumps; I'm weak in spelling.
  11. deficient in the essential or usual properties or ingredients:weak tea.
  12. Phoneticsunstressed, as a syllable, vowel, or word.
  13. Grammar(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.
  14. Grammar(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'').
  15. Nutrition(of wheat or flour) having a low gluten content or having a poor quality of gluten.
  16. Photographythin;
    not dense.
  17. Business[Com.]characterized by a decline in prices:The market was weak in the morning but rallied in the afternoon.
  • 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
  • Middle English weik 1250–1300
    1. breakable, delicate. 2. senile, sickly, unwell, invalid. 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. 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.
    1. strong.
Collins Concise English Dictionary © HarperCollins Publishers::
weak /wiːk/ adj
  1. lacking in physical or mental strength or force; frail or feeble
  2. liable to yield, break, or give way: a weak link in a chain
  3. lacking in resolution or firmness of character
  4. lacking strength, power, or intensity: a weak voice
  5. lacking strength in a particular part: a team weak in defence
    • not functioning as well as normal: weak eyes
    • easily upset: a weak stomach
  7. lacking in conviction, persuasiveness, etc: a weak argument
  8. lacking in political or strategic strength: a weak state
  9. lacking the usual, full, or desirable strength of flavour: weak tea
    • 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 patterns
  11. (of a syllable) not accented or stressed
  12. (of a fuel-air mixture) containing a relatively low proportion of fuel
  13. (of an industry, market, currency, securities, etc) falling in price or characterized by falling prices
Etymology: Old English wāc soft, miserable; related to Old Saxon wēk, Old High German weih, Old Norse veikrˈweakish adj
'weak' also found in these entries (note: many are not synonyms or translations):
Collocations: weak [muscles, password, flavor, proposal, comeback], weak on [defense, terrorism, national politics], weak in [faith, math, school], more...

🗣️Forum discussions with the word(s) "weak" in the title:

A consumer can have only a weak experience...
a drop of further weak delay
A more sophisticated way to say "I have a weak bladder"?
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a/the weak-willed West
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Active counterpart to passive quasi-modal be with weak dynamic
adapts their eyes on a daily schedule for bright or for weak light
are weak and 'must be reinforced'
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At pronunciation weak or strong?
because 'they' were too weak [they = ?]
Booze hound, booze lover, half cupper, weak sister and kid's stuff
bully the weak, fear the tough
come of a weak line of the nation
delicate / weak [female family members]
Devalued/get weak
Don't [weak form]
Education system is weak.
either for money laundering or weak controls
Elastic force is weak
Exploiting that weak link
eye-wateringly weak
Fault (bad or weak aspect of a person's character)
feeble or weak
more...

Look up "weak" at Merriam-Webster
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