Entry Word: thoughtful

Function: adjective

Meaning: 1 given to or made with heedful anticipation of the needs and happiness of others <a thoughtful offer to watch the neighborsʼ children on moving day> <a thoughtful aunt who never forgets the birthday of a niece or nephew>

Synonyms attentive, considerate, kind, solicitous

Related Words brotherly, good, good-hearted, helpful, hospitable, kindhearted, kindly, neighborly, nice; caring, compassionate, sympathetic, tender; chivalrous, courteous, courtly, gallant, gracious, polite; diplomatic, tactful; deferential, dutiful, obliging, regardful, respectful; altruistic, beneficent, benevolent, benignant, humane, selfless, unselfish; charitable, generous, magnanimous

Near Antonyms inattentive, uncaring, unheeding; inhospitable, unkind, unkindly, unneighborly; ill-bred, ill-mannered, impolite, rude, uncivil, uncourteous, unmannerly; unhelpful, unobliging; malevolent, malicious, mean, spiteful

Antonyms heedless, inconsiderate, thoughtless, unthinking

2 decided on as a result of careful thought <a thoughtful argument for military action> — see deliberate 1
3 given to or marked by long, quiet thinking <was a quiet and thoughtful child who rarely spoke but when he did, he almost always had something worthwhile to say> — see contemplative