puny

adjective

pu·​ny ˈpyü-nē How to pronounce puny (audio)
punier; puniest
: slight or inferior in power, size, or importance : weak
punily adverb
puniness noun

Examples of puny in a Sentence

I wouldn't mess with him—he makes bodybuilders look puny in comparison. We laughed at their puny attempt to trick us.
Recent Examples on the Web By capitalizing on the shortage of vacation rentals in the early 2000s, hotel chains significantly raised the prices for their puny rooms, only to see the industry disrupted by VRBO and Airbnb. Mikhail Papovsky, Forbes, 27 Feb. 2024 One human in a puny rental car can’t take in the scale of the global supply chain, but even this sliver of something so vast was enough to inspire awe. Malia Wollan, New York Times, 23 Jan. 2024 As much as experts are convinced that puny plastics are all around us, few methods to date have been able to directly detect them. Shi En Kim, Smithsonian Magazine, 8 Jan. 2024 Even our galaxy—all 100,000 light-years of it—is just far bigger than our puny human brains are capable of dealing with. Consider this. Paul Sutter, Ars Technica, 18 May 2023 The redwoods outside my window are perhaps 100 feet tall – puny by comparison to their northern brethren. Discover Magazine, 6 Jan. 2024 In an era of ultra-low rates, those mortgages and bonds paid out puny interest. Paul Wiseman, Fortune, 20 Dec. 2023 Since peaking in early 2018, American’s shares have dropped roughly 90%, crushing its market capitalization to a puny $7.1 billion as of October 27, a figure so shrunken that this iconic name now sputters as only as America’s 478th most valuable public enterprise. Shawn Tully, Fortune, 11 Nov. 2023 As a matter of survival, Ukraine’s army needs many things very quickly, but startups and other civilian manufacturers are often too puny to meet its urgent demands—or, for that matter, to find solutions to the electronic warfare raging at the front. Samanth Subramanian, WIRED, 5 Oct. 2023

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'puny.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

Anglo-French puisné younger, weakly, literally, born afterward, from puis afterward + born

First Known Use

circa 1577, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of puny was circa 1577

Dictionary Entries Near puny

Cite this Entry

“Puny.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/puny. Accessed 28 Mar. 2024.

Kids Definition

puny

adjective
pu·​ny ˈpyü-nē How to pronounce puny (audio)
punier; puniest
: slight or lesser in power, size, or importance : weak
puniness noun
Etymology

from early French puisné "younger," literally, "born afterward," from puis "afterward" and "born"

More from Merriam-Webster on puny

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