as in unfortunate
having, prone to, or marked by bad luck
a luckless team with the worst record in the league
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
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.
Recent Examples of luckless
Vasyanovych plays Roman, a luckless director who’s out of work and trying to shoot his latest film in a country whose dwindling population is still traumatized by the war.
—
Christopher Vourlias, Variety, 6 Sep. 2025
Christopher Vourlias, Variety, 6 Sep. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for luckless
Adjective
-
Toni Preckwinkle has served the city of Chicago and Cook County ably throughout her long political career and done much to make life better for the unfortunate among us.—
The Editorial Board,
Chicago Tribune,
31 Jan. 2026
-
French Stewart played Harry Solomon, who was known for his odd posture, nervous energy, and the unfortunate fact that alien messages arrived through his head.—
Tereza Shkurtaj,
PEOPLE,
31 Jan. 2026
Adjective
-
Domingo Morel, a professor at New York University who studies state takeovers of local schools, said most local residents wind up unhappy with the methods used by state interventionists and the results.—
Bri Hatch,
Chalkbeat,
26 Jan. 2026
-
Audrey, the single and childless and PhD-less product of a stable but unhappy home, has fallen short of the life planned out for her by her parents.—
Angie Han,
HollywoodReporter,
24 Jan. 2026
Adjective
-
Hence, this nimble, propulsive movie, given a loose intimacy by Juan Sarmiento’s 16mm cinematography, proves to be oddly heartfelt when seemingly most cruel about Oscar’s hapless earnestness.—
Robert Abele,
Los Angeles Times,
30 Jan. 2026
-
Or the hapless sidekick (Jacob Batalon of the Tom Holland Spider-Man films) who is usually the brunt of the joke.—
Frank Scheck,
HollywoodReporter,
26 Jan. 2026
Adjective
-
Secretary Noem paused the diversity lottery to ensure no more Americans are harmed by this disastrous program.—
Michael Sinkewicz,
FOXNews.com,
31 Jan. 2026
-
The main issues on that offense were instability at offensive coordinator, as owner Woody Johnson forced him to fire Mike LaFleur after the 2022 season and replace him with the disastrous Nathaniel Hackett.—
Zack Rosenblatt,
New York Times,
31 Jan. 2026
Adjective
-
As part of Progressive’s Backup campaign, DeVito surprised one, well, unlucky fan who had the fantasy football punishment of having to set up a lemonade stand in freezing cold Boston for a day.—
Scott Thompson,
FOXNews.com,
29 Jan. 2026
-
Aston Villa and Lille secured automatic qualification with wins against Celtic and Feyenoord, progressing to the last 16 at the expense of Atalanta, who drew 2-2 in Barcelona, and Milan, who lost 2-1 away at Dinamo Zagreb (who were the unlucky team eliminated with 11 points).—
Eduardo Tansley,
New York Times,
28 Jan. 2026
Adjective
-
Burford has stepped in nicely for hard-luck left guard Ben Bartch.—
Jerry McDonald,
Mercury News,
20 Dec. 2025
-
And so UMass is doing what many hard-luck gamblers have done before: double down.—
Lev Akabas,
Sportico.com,
24 Nov. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Luckless.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/luckless. Accessed 2 Feb. 2026.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
