vicious

1. 1.

   (of persons or their actions) able or disposed to inflict pain or suffering

   “a barbarous crime”

   “brutal beatings”

   “cruel tortures”

   “Stalin's roughshod treatment of the kulaks”

   “a savage slap”

   “vicious kicks”

   Synonymsbarbarousbrutalcruelfellroughshodsavage

   Similarinhumane
2. 2.

   having the nature of vice

   Synonymsevil

   Similarwicked
3. 3.

   bringing or deserving severe rebuke or censure

   “a criminal waste of talent”

   “a deplorable act of violence”

   “adultery is as reprehensible for a husband as for a wife”

   Synonymscondemnablecriminaldeplorablereprehensible

   Similarwrong
4. 4.

   marked by deep ill will; deliberately harmful

   “poisonous hate”

   “venomous criticism”

   “vicious gossip”

   Synonymspoisonousvenomous

   Similarmalicious

Other forms of vicious

comparative

viciouser·

superlative

viciousest·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about vicious

What does vicious mean?

vicious means "(of persons or their actions) able or disposed to inflict pain or suffering". That is the primary sense; the word has 4 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in vicious?

vicious has 2 syllables: vic-ious. The stress falls on "vic". In IPA it is /ˈvɪʃəs/.

What is another word for vicious?

Close synonyms include barbarous, brutal, cruel, fell, roughshod. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is vicious a common word?

vicious is banded "Common" — everyday vocabulary in speech and writing. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.