heavy
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: enpr: hevʹi
ipa: /ˈhɛv.i/
ipa: /ˈhev.i/
rhymes: -ɛvi
Forms: form: heavier
form: heaviest
Etymology: From Middle English hevy, heviȝ, from Old English hefiġ, hefeġ, hæfiġ (“heavy; important, grave, severe, serious; oppressive, grievous; slow, dull”), from Proto-West Germanic *habīg (“heavy, hefty, weighty”), from Proto-Germanic *habīgaz (“heavy, hefty, weighty”), from Proto-Indo-European *keh₂p- (“to take, grasp, hold”). Related to have.
Cognate with Scots hevy, havy, heavy (“heavy”), Saterland Frisian heeuwich, häwich (“violent, angry”), West Frisian hevich (“violent”), Dutch hevig (“violent, severe, intense, acute”), German Low German hevig (“violent, fierce, intense, angry”), German hebig (compare heftig (“fierce, severe, intense, violent, heavy”)), Icelandic höfugur (“heavy, weighty, important”), Latin capāx (“large, wide, roomy, spacious, capacious, capable, apt”).
Compare typologically Russian объёмный (obʺjómnyj), ёмкий (jómkij) (akin to име́ть (imétʹ), взять (vzjatʹ)).
Senses: examples: text: Can you help me carry this? It's really heavy.
text: Use the scales to measure how heavy it is.
text: Sunning himself on the board steps, I saw for the first time Mr. Farquhar Fenelon Cooke.[…]A silver snaffle on a heavy leather watch guard which connected the pockets of his corduroy waistcoat, together with a huge gold stirrup in his Ascot tie, sufficiently proclaimed his tastes.
ref: 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter II, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
text: But now, ten years later, after his recent shipwreck, he cannot compete as a runner, though he can outthrow the slighter Phaeacians with the heaviest discus.
ref: 2002, Eva Brann, Homeric Moments, page 48:
text: In other research, scientists have found that people who kept cereal out in the open were often about 20 pounds heavier than people who kept cereal behind closed doors.
ref: 2015 May 18, Angus Chen, How We Store Food At Home Could Be Linked To How Much We Eat:
glosses: Having great weight.
raw_tags: of a physical object
examples: text: "We're still in an existential-stakes war with the Pa'anuri, and possibly with our own destructive tendencies." ' "Sorry. That was pretty heavy for someone who just woke up." "Oh, I'm fine. Waking up alive has ALWAYS meant spending the day trying not to be dead."
ref: 2020 January 8, Howard Tayler, Schlock Mercenary, archived from the original on 13 Feb 2025:
glosses: Serious, somber.
raw_tags: of a topic
examples: text: heavy yokes, expenses, undertakings, trials, news, etc.
text: The hand of the Lord was heavy upon them of Ashdod.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Samuel 5:6:
text: The king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make.
ref: 1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]:
text: Sent hither by my Husband to impart the heavy news.
ref: 1814, William Wordsworth, The Excursion:
glosses: Not easy to bear; burdensome; oppressive.
examples: text: This film is heavy.
glosses: Good.
examples: text: The Moody Blues are, like, heavy.
qualifier: late 1960s
glosses: Profound.
examples: 1998, Stanley George Clayton, ""Menstruation" in Encyclopedia Britannica
The ovarian response to gonadotropic hormones may be erratic at first, so that irregular or heavy bleeding sometimes occurs
glosses: High, great.
raw_tags: of a rate of flow
examples: text: Come heavy, or not at all.
glosses: Armed.
examples: text: Metal is heavier than rock.
glosses: Loud, distorted, or intense.
raw_tags: of music
glosses: Hot and humid.
raw_tags: of weather
examples: text: He was a heavy sleeper, a heavy eater and a heavy smoker – certainly not an ideal husband.
text: He was described in the theatrical prints as the “veteran Blenkinsop”—“the useful Blenkinsop”—“that old favourite of the public, Blenkinsop”—those parts in the drama, which are called the heavy fathers, were usually assigned to this veteran, who, indeed, acted the heavy father in public, as in private life.
ref: 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 29, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:
glosses: Doing the specified activity more intensely than most other people.
raw_tags: of a person
examples: text: Watch for the signs of fatigue, including yawning, blinking and heavy eyes.
ref: 2021 December 23, The Road Ahead, Brisbane, page 11, column 3:
glosses: With eyelids difficult to keep open due to tiredness.
raw_tags: of the eyes
examples: text: Cheese-stuffed sausage is too heavy to eat before exercising.
glosses: High in fat or protein; difficult to digest.
raw_tags: of food
examples: text: it was a heavy storm; a heavy slumber in bed; a heavy punch
text: The surf was not heavy, and there was no undertow, so we made shore easily, effecting an equally easy landing.
ref: 1918 September–November, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Land That Time Forgot”, in The Blue Book Magazine, Chicago, Ill.: Story-press Corp., →OCLC; republished as chapter IV, in Hugo Gernsback, editor, Amazing Stories, (please specify |part=I to III), New York, N.Y.: Experimenter Publishing, 1927, →OCLC:
text: [Rural solar plant] schemes are of little help to industry or other heavy users of electricity. Nor is solar power yet as cheap as the grid. For all that, the rapid arrival of electric light to Indian villages is long overdue. When the national grid suffers its next huge outage, as it did in July 2012 when hundreds of millions were left in the dark, look for specks of light in the villages.
ref: 2013 July 20, “Out of the gloom”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:
glosses: Of great force, power, or intensity; deep or intense.
examples: text: his eyes were heavy with sleep; she was heavy with child
text: The heavy [sorrowing] nobles all in council were.
ref: 1614–1615, Homer, “(please specify the book number)”, in Geo[rge] Chapman, transl., Homer’s Odysses. […], London: […] Rich[ard] Field [and William Jaggard], for Nathaniell Butter, published 1615, →OCLC; republished in The Odysseys of Homer, […], volume (please specify the book number), London: John Russell Smith, […], 1857, →OCLC:
text: A light wife doth make a heavy husband.
ref: c. 1596–1598 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]:
text: Seating himselfe within a darkesome cave, / (Such places heavy Saturnists doe crave,) / Where yet the gladsome day was never seene […]
ref: 1613, William Browne, Britannia's Pastorals:
glosses: Laden with that which is weighty; encumbered; burdened; bowed down, either with an actual burden, or with grief, pain, disappointment, etc.
examples: text: a heavy gait, looks, manners, style, etc.
text: a heavy writer or book
text: whilst the heavy ploughman snores
ref: c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene i]:
text: a heavy, dull, degenerate mind
ref: 1700, [John] Dryden, “Cymon and Iphigenia, from Boccace”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:
text: Neither [is] his ear heavy, that it cannot hear.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Isaiah 59:1:
glosses: Slow; sluggish; inactive; or lifeless, dull, inanimate, stupid.
examples: text: The next day we only made some eight miles, as the road was heavy beyond all belief. It lay through a desert region of country which was ancle-deep ^([sic]) in soda and alkali dust.
ref: 1861, E. J. Guerin, Mountain Charley, page 37:
text: a heavy road; a heavy soil
glosses: Impeding motion; cloggy; clayey.
examples: text: heavy bread
glosses: Not raised or leavened.
glosses: Having much body or strength.
raw_tags: of wines or spirits
glosses: With child; pregnant.
topics: natural-sciences
physical-sciences
physics
glosses: Containing one or more isotopes that are heavier than the normal one.
qualifier: oil industry
glosses: Of petroleum, having high viscosity.
examples: text: The very low prices of brandy, and the continuance of a heavy market for such a length of time, have begun to attract buyers; […]
ref: 1819, The Scots Magazine, volumes 83-84, page 577:
text: The oil market is heavy, each day bringing along further supplies of shares from people who have not tired of the long-continued decline in the market.
ref: 1922, The Investor's Monthly Manual: A Newspaper for Investors, page 626:
topics: business
finance
glosses: Of a market: in which the price of shares is declining.
topics: government
military
nautical
politics
transport
war
glosses: Heavily-armed.
topics: aeronautics
aerospace
aviation
business
engineering
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
glosses: Having a relatively high takeoff weight and payload.
raw_tags: of an aircraft
examples: text: In a firm voice he said, “World Wide Six heavy is ready for takeoff.”
ref: 1990, Perry Francis Lafferty, The Downing of Flight Six Heavy, page 85:
topics: aeronautics
aerospace
aviation
business
engineering
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
glosses: Having a relatively high takeoff weight and payload.
Having a maximum takeoff weight exceeding 300,000 tons, as almost all widebodies do, generating high wake turbulence.
raw_tags: of an aircraft
Synonyms: sweer
swear
Derived terms: as heavy as a dead donkey
heavier-than-air
heavily
heaviness
heavisome
heavy-armed
heavy artillery
heavy as a dead donkey
heavy-bearded
heavy bomber
heavy bread
heavy breather
heavy breathing
heavy-browed
heavy cavalry
heavy chain
heavy chemicals
heavy client
heavy-coated
heavy cream
heavy cross to bear
heavy cruiser
heavy date
heavy drinker
heavy drinking
heavy-duty
heavy-duty vehicle
heavy earth
heavy element
heavy equipment
heavyeyed
heavy fermion
heavy-foot
heavy-footed
heavy-footed moa
heavy frigate
heavy glass
heavy going
heavy goods vehicle
heavy-handed
heavy-handedly
heavy-handedness
heavy-headed
heavy heart
heavy-hearted
heavyhearted
heavy-heartedly
heavy-heartedness
heavy hitter
heavy-hitter
heavy hydrogen
heavy ice
heavy icebreaker
heavy industry
heavy infantry
heavy ion
heavyish
heavy legs
heavy-lidded
heavy-lift
heavy lift
heavy-lifting
heavy lifting
heavy machine gun
heavy machinery
heavy man
heavy marching order
heavy metal
heavy metally
heavy metal umlaut
heavy middleweight
heavy mineral
heavy mob
heavy oil
heavy particle
heavy petting
heavy piece
heavy plough
heavy rail
heavy rock
heavy roller
heavy-set
heavyset
heavy sink
heavy spar
heavy swell
heavy tail
heavy-tailed
heavy tank
heavy vehicle
heavy-water
heavy water
heavyweight
heavy wet
heavy wetter
heavy with child
hot and heavy
hyperheavy
jug-heavy
Late Heavy Bombardment
make heavy going of
make heavy weather
make heavy weather of
nonheavy
overheavy
semi-heavy water
semiheavy water
superheavy
super-heavy
super heavy
super-heavy frigate
super heavy water
super-heavy water
time hangs heavy
top-heavy
top-heavy fraction
top-heavy with drink
ultraheavy
unheavy
wee heavy
Related terms: heave
heft