1
as in bleak
causing or marked by an atmosphere lacking in cheer
a desolate house abandoned many years ago
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in lonely
sad from lack of companionship or separation from others
he was less desolate after adopting a rescue dog
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3
as in deserted
left unoccupied or unused
a desolate mining town that had its brief heyday more than a century ago
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4
as in barren
producing inferior or only a small amount of vegetation
wild, desolate plains on which only the hardiest could survive
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as in to ruin
to bring to a complete end the physical soundness, existence, or usefulness of
totally desolated the city with aerial bombs
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of desolate
Brittney Melton, NPR, 28 July 2025
Padam and Tulsi, whose remote Himalayan village has become increasingly desolate as families migrate to cities, leaving the pair to wonder who will perform their last rites.
—Variety Staff, Variety, 25 July 2025
Imagine how desolate the Democrats are that a Democrat running on affordability is an anti-establishment Democrat.
—Ted Reed, Forbes.com, 16 July 2025
Pacific Boulevard, where mid-century buildings evoke a bygone era, is desolate.
—Los Angeles Times, 11 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for desolate
Adjective
But that area was desolate and the heat was searing.
—Brittney Melton, NPR, 28 July 2025
Padam and Tulsi, whose remote Himalayan village has become increasingly desolate as families migrate to cities, leaving the pair to wonder who will perform their last rites.
—Variety Staff, Variety, 25 July 2025
Imagine how desolate the Democrats are that a Democrat running on affordability is an anti-establishment Democrat.
—Ted Reed, Forbes.com, 16 July 2025
Pacific Boulevard, where mid-century buildings evoke a bygone era, is desolate.
—Los Angeles Times, 11 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for desolate
Recent Examples of Synonyms for desolate
Adjective
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Directed by Paul Schrader with a script by Bret Easton Ellis, this spiritually bleak L.A. drama features Lohan’s most daring performance, and probably the only one that manages to break completely with her childhood and adolescent roles.—
Tom Gliatto,
People.com,
9 Aug. 2025
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The situation is bleak enough that, even if aid increases rapidly in the coming weeks, deaths from starvation are almost certain to rise.—
Isaac Chotiner,
New Yorker,
5 Aug. 2025
Adjective
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The movie Marty was based on Chayefsky’s television drama about two lonely people finding love.—
Greg Evans,
Deadline,
5 Aug. 2025
-
Hero Ellen Ripley’s (Sigourney Weaver) lonely fight for survival gave way to a military mission to vanquish aliens ravaging a human colony; Cameron filled the frame with cocky Marines, boxy space tanks, and an adorable orphan who finds in Ripley a surrogate mother.—
Judy Berman,
Time,
5 Aug. 2025
Adjective
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What might more readily bring about a crisis of identity than the physical alteration of the body, the change from bearer of life to barren woman?—
Hillary Kelly,
The Atlantic,
5 Aug. 2025
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Most of those barren years came before a current regime that has taken English cricket to new highs of attacking intent.—
Tim Ellis,
Forbes.com,
4 Aug. 2025
Verb
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Her Altadena home and the surrounding community were ruined by the Eaton wildfires that ripped through Los Angeles in January.—
Lauren Brown West-Rosenthal,
Parents,
14 Aug. 2025
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However, for some, gambling is an addiction that can ruin lives and families.—
Don Sweeney,
Miami Herald,
14 Aug. 2025
Adjective
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Sydney Sweeney’s new dark crime comedy Americana is new in theaters this weekend.—
Tim Lammers,
Forbes.com,
15 Aug. 2025
-
Inside, four bedrooms and three bathrooms are spread across roughly 2,600 square feet of single-level living space boasting dark hardwood floors and high ceilings dotted with skylights.—
Wendy Bowman,
Robb Report,
14 Aug. 2025
Adjective
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On his release, Stern went on to spend the 1950s ping-ponging between New York and California, for a time living on a disused laundry barge in Sausalito.—
News Desk,
Artforum,
3 Mar. 2025
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One of the most powerful scenes in Sugarcane takes place in a disused barn where, over a period of decades, Indigenous children worked under the lash.—
Matthew Carey,
Deadline,
8 Feb. 2025
Adjective
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Having two of the three most impoverished cities, especially when those cities are experiencing booming population growth, is its own kind of economic miracle, if an ignominious one.—
Kathryn Anne Edwards,
Mercury News,
7 Aug. 2025
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The eye-popping dollar figures in the statements contrast with everything else happening on an impoverished island, where people spend much of their time without electricity and many still depend on meager food rations to survive.—
Nora Gamez Torres,
Miami Herald,
6 Aug. 2025
Verb
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But when our home was destroyed, our studio lost, and the war displaced us to Khanyounis’s tent camps, cooking became less about flavor and more about survival.—
Hamada Shaqoura,
Time,
7 Aug. 2025
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There were 25 diesel buses that were destroyed per the grant regulations, Young said.—
Harley Walls,
Arkansas Online,
7 Aug. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Desolate.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/desolate. Accessed 21 Aug. 2025.
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