schadenfreude
noun
Lisa Respers France
Did you know?
Ever a popular lookup on our site, schadenfreude refers to the joy you might feel at another person’s pain. It’s a compound of the German nouns Schaden, meaning “damage,” and Freude, meaning “joy.” Schadenfreude was a favored subject in Germany by the time it was introduced to English in the mid-1800s; discussed by the likes of Schopenhauer, Kant, and Nietzsche, schadenfreude was showing up in psychology books, literature for children, and critical theory. In English, the word was used mostly by academics until the early 1990s, when it was introduced to more general audiences via pop culture. In a 1991 episode of The Simpsons, for example, Lisa explains schadenfreude to Homer, who is gloating at his neighbor’s failure; she also tells him that the opposite of schadenfreude is sour grapes. “Boy,” he marvels, “those Germans have a word for everything.”
Examples of schadenfreude in a Sentence
Los Angeles Times, 6 Mar. 2026
For decades, that Iranian proxies had targeted American allies with relative impunity had been a source of schadenfreude for Beijing.
—Charlie Campbell, Time, 6 Mar. 2026
Given the dire state of the specialty film space — let alone the anxious state of Hollywood — even those who once looked on with schadenfreude at Annapurna’s downfall are now rooting for a comeback.
—Mia Galuppo, HollywoodReporter, 5 Mar. 2026
Blue collar workers may be enjoying a certain degree of schadenfreude at seeing the panic over tech, finance, and other white collar workers potentially losing their jobs to AI.
—Frank Landymore, Futurism, 25 Feb. 2026
See All Example Sentences for schadenfreude
Cite this Entry
“Schadenfreude.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/schadenfreude. Accessed 12 Mar. 2026.
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