cold-bloodedly

adverb

as in heartlessly

Related Words

Relevance

Dissimilar Words

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for cold-bloodedly
  1. heartlessly
  2. ruthlessly
  3. pitilessly
  4. mercilessly
  5. callously
  6. inhumanly
  7. unsparingly
  8. inhumanely
Adverb
  • Victim Nyron Shaw’s father said the driver who mowed his son down last year in Ocean Hill a day before Independence Day should face the maximum penalty for allegedly driving twice the speed limit and heartlessly taking off, leaving his son to die.
    — Nicholas Williams, New York Daily News, 8 Apr. 2026
  • In the process, Joel heartlessly killed some innocent people, including medical professionals.
    — EW.com, EW.com, 26 Aug. 2025
Definition of heartlessly
Adverb
  • The garment industry is ruthlessly competitive and manufacturers fear that any rise in costs or supply disruption could see orders shift to rival Vietnam, Cambodia, or Pakistan.
    — Charlie Campbell, Time, 20 Oct. 2026
  • Theorists such as Nick Bostrom have long warned that an advanced model might inflict immense harm by taking a human prompt too literally and pursuing its goal too ruthlessly.
    — NIALL FERGUSON, Foreign Affairs, 20 Oct. 2026
Definition of ruthlessly
Adverb
  • The season finale brings the various strands of the story together elegantly and a bit pitilessly, too, as the body count continues to rise and the struggle for survival grows genuinely desperate.
    — Scott Tobias, Vulture, 21 Oct. 2026
Definition of pitilessly
Adverb
  • But there were more hilarious moments, the biggest being Tkachuk's full-on heel turn when the team showed a tribute video that got mercilessly booed by the crowd.
    — Matt Reigle OutKick, FOXNews.com, 22 Oct. 2026
  • This is no small feat in a city where working class locals are priced out mercilessly to make way for the ultra-wealthy here to work on their winter tans.
    — Amanda Rosa, Miami Herald, 2 Sep. 2026
Definition of mercilessly
Adverb
  • Along with that oh-so-sweet commercial success came rounds of discourse that callously dissected her racial identity, her relationship with her Blackness, and the winding history of genre in the context of American music.
    — Kyle Denis, Billboard, 21 Oct. 2026
  • While Boeing callously deflects blame for their negligence, a family of one victim finds strength in gathering collective mourning.
    — Matthew Carey, Deadline, 14 Oct. 2026
Definition of callously
Adverb
  • For her next project, she’s headed as far from there as humanly (or inhumanly) possible.
    — Kory Grow, Rolling Stone, 24 June 2026
Definition of inhumanly
Adverb
  • Kahlo vibrantly and unsparingly depicted herself and events from her life, which was upended by a bus accident at 18.
    — Hannah Schoenbaum, Fortune, 24 Nov. 2025
  • The episode unsparingly examines cultural assumptions about race and colorism; similarly, HIM is a scathing critique of how professional sports capitalize upon the bodies and minds of Black athletes.
    — Neda Ulaby, NPR, 19 Sep. 2025
Definition of unsparingly
Adverb
  • Walter’s ties to immigrant detention resulted in protests from members of the Los Angeles community, including many Dodgers fans, who felt that ICE inhumanely targeted them.
    — Peter Chawaga, Forbes.com, 29 July 2026
  • In May 2025, the zoo posted a video of authorities taking a giraffe and accused them of seizing it inhumanely.
    — Saman Shafiq, USA Today, 22 June 2026
Definition of inhumanely
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Browse Nearby Words

cold-blooded
cold-bloodedly
cold-bloodedness
See all Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“Cold-bloodedly.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/cold-bloodedly. Accessed 26 Oct. 2026.

Copy Citation
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences

More from Merriam-Webster

Word of the Day

Listen to the pronunciation of disparate

See Definitions and Examples »

Popular in Grammar & Usage

See More

Merriam-Webster’s Great Big List of Words You Love to Hate

'Can' vs. 'May'

'Affect' vs. 'Effect'

More Commonly Mispronounced Words

'A' or 'an'? What about before 'h'? An Indefinite Article Guide
See More

Popular in Wordplay

See More

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't

12 Lovely and Unusual Words for the Natural World

Why do we 'bury the lede?'

'Za' and 9 Other Words to Help You Win at SCRABBLE
See More

Popular

See More

Merriam-Webster’s Great Big List of Words You Love to Hate

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't
See More

Games & Quizzes

See All
Play Quordle: Guess all four words in a limited number of tries. Each of your guesses must be a real 5-letter word.
Quordle Can you solve 4 words at once?
Play Blossom: Solve today's spelling word game by finding as many words as you can using just 7 letters. Longer words score more points.
Blossom Pick the best words!
Play Missing Letter: a crossword with a twist. Each of the 25 puzzle words start with a different letter of the alphabet. Which letter is missing?
The Missing Letter A daily crossword with a twist
different halloween monsters in silhouette
A Monstrous Vocab Quiz Words That Go Bump in the Night
See All