as in vicious
having or showing a desire to cause someone pain or suffering for the sheer enjoyment of it
the neighborhood chatterbox has again been spreading malicious gossip
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Recent Examples of malicious
The call was fake, a malicious hoax.
—
Charles Minshew, AJC.com, 7 Apr. 2026
Additionally, advanced signal-processing techniques can help identify whether messages are genuinely coming from different sources or are being manipulated by a single malicious actor.
—Prabhat Ranjan Mishra, Interesting Engineering, 6 Apr. 2026
Causing malicious damage to a motor vehicle.
—Flint McColgan, Boston Herald, 4 Apr. 2026
The TeamPCP hacking group planted malicious code inside LiteLLM, a tool used by developers to plug their applications into AI services from companies including OpenAI and Anthropic, that is typically downloaded millions of times per day, according to security firm Snyk.
—Beatrice Nolan, Fortune, 2 Apr. 2026
See All Example Sentences for malicious
Charles Minshew, AJC.com, 7 Apr. 2026
Additionally, advanced signal-processing techniques can help identify whether messages are genuinely coming from different sources or are being manipulated by a single malicious actor.
—Prabhat Ranjan Mishra, Interesting Engineering, 6 Apr. 2026
Causing malicious damage to a motor vehicle.
—Flint McColgan, Boston Herald, 4 Apr. 2026
The TeamPCP hacking group planted malicious code inside LiteLLM, a tool used by developers to plug their applications into AI services from companies including OpenAI and Anthropic, that is typically downloaded millions of times per day, according to security firm Snyk.
—Beatrice Nolan, Fortune, 2 Apr. 2026
See All Example Sentences for malicious
Recent Examples of Synonyms for malicious
Adjective
-
The wereboar growled next to Black Pudding, a hulking vicious monster, both focused on ripping Puck and Cordelia to shreds.—
Jaclyn Cosgrove,
Los Angeles Times,
10 Apr. 2026
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The childishness of his expressions infantilized a genuinely vicious regime, painting it as more peevish than petrifying.—
Fintan O’Toole,
The New York Review of Books,
9 Apr. 2026
Adjective
-
Dahl’s books are fanciful and imaginative, but also dark, cynical, and mean (and, unfortunately, often reflected his real-life ugliness), spinning stories in which gruesome and unpleasant fates befell rotten kids, and adults were frequently selfish, cruel, and not to be trusted.—
Wilson Chapman,
IndieWire,
10 Apr. 2026
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Violating that trust is both cruel and unlawful.—
DeJanay Booth-Singleton,
CBS News,
10 Apr. 2026
Adjective
-
When this fails to happen—and her hopes of marrying off a perfect daughter are dashed—Barbara grows hateful and ultimately delusional.—
Boris Kachka,
The Atlantic,
3 Apr. 2026
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For generations, students have learned about complex historical figures who, despite their positive contributions to society, were inarguably problematic, hateful or bigoted while alive.—
Kristy Hutchings,
Daily News,
29 Mar. 2026
Adjective
-
Bisontis’ pass-protection profile doesn’t need a publicist, but his ceiling depends on how much nastier and more consistent the run-blocking becomes.—
Eddie Brown,
San Diego Union-Tribune,
10 Apr. 2026
-
Andoni Iraola’s side is nasty to play against.—
Jackie Powell,
NBC news,
10 Apr. 2026
Adjective
-
Fear may thrive in the shadows, but here, under bright fluorescent lights, the terror feels even more malevolent, something ambient and inescapable.—
Justin Chang,
New Yorker,
10 Apr. 2026
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Palmer turned Amazing Stories into an organ promoting eccentric theories of a hollow earth where malevolent creatures ruled, a claim promulgated by Richard Sharpe Shaver, a fan of the magazine who was also institutionalized due to paranoid schizophrenia.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
10 Apr. 2026
Adjective
-
That the spiteful man sees only as far as the spiteful man can, and that can produce a work of art that is successful, but maybe not ultimately great.—
David Frum,
The Atlantic,
25 Mar. 2026
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Tourette’s can feel spiteful and searches out the most upsetting tic for me personally and for those around me.—
Clayton Davis,
Variety,
24 Feb. 2026
Adjective
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Human disease may be acute, chronic, malignant, or benign, and it is usually indicated by signs and symptoms such as fever or vomiting.—
Encyclopedia Britannica,
Encyclopedia Britannica,
2 Apr. 2026
-
In 2000, Norris Church Mailer was diagnosed with a malignant gastrointestinal tumor.—
Arkansas Online,
Arkansas Online,
28 Mar. 2026
Cite this Entry
“Malicious.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/malicious. Accessed 12 Apr. 2026.
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