harmful

A2 Topic:Describing Qualities

US /ˈhɑɹmfl̩/ UK /ˈhɑːmfl̩/ See IPA manual

Freq #13411

Meanings

1

adj
Causing or able to cause harm or damage.

Too much sun can be harmful to your skin.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 adj · causing or able to cause... damaging detrimental injurious hurtful

Opposites

beneficial harmless helpful innocent innocuousinnoxiousinoffensive undamaging unharmful valuable

Etymology

From Middle English harmful, from Old English *hearmful (suggested by hearmfullīċ (“harmful; hurtful”)), equivalent to harm + -ful. Cognate with German harmvoll, Danish harmfuld, Swedish harmfull.

harmful Middle English *hearmful Old English

View etymology graph ->

Topics

Describing Qualities

External links

# harmful

**Type:** Word
**Level:** A2
**Part of speech:** adj
**IPA (US):** /ˈhɑɹmfl̩/
**IPA (UK):** /ˈhɑːmfl̩/
**Frequency rank:** 13411

## Meanings
1. Causing or able to cause harm or damage.

## Examples
- Too much sun can be harmful to your skin.

## Antonyms
- beneficial
- harmless
- helpful
- innocent
- innocuous
- innoxious
- inoffensive
- undamaging
- unharmful
- valuable

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: harmful
- Root: *hearmful

## Etymology
From Middle English harmful, from Old English *hearmful (suggested by hearmfullīċ (“harmful; hurtful”)), equivalent to harm + -ful. Cognate with German harmvoll, Danish harmfuld, Swedish harmfull.

## AI Etymology
Harmful comes from Middle English harmful, from Old English *hearmful (suggested by hearmfullīċ (“harmful; hurtful”)), equivalent to harm + -ful. Cognate with German harmvoll, Danish harmfuld, Swedish harmfull. The analysis is mainly morphological: the modern adjectival form is built from the named base and affix. In current use, the main sense is “Causing or able to cause harm or damage”.

## Topics
- Describing Qualities

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