unhappy meaning

unhappy as an adjective

1. experiencing or marked by or causing sadness or sorrow or discontent
   • unhappy over her departure
   • unhappy with her raise
   • after the argument they lapsed into an unhappy silence
   • had an unhappy time at school
   • the unhappy (or sad) news
   • he looks so sad

   Opposite: happy

   Similar: lovesick, miserable

   Related forms: unhappiness

2. generalized feeling of distress

   Synonyms: dysphoric, distressed

   Related forms: unhappiness

3. causing discomfort
   • the unhappy truth

   Similar: unpleasant

4. marked by or producing unhappiness
   • infelicitous circumstances
   • unhappy caravans, straggling afoot through swamps and canebrakes

   Synonyms: infelicitous

   Similar: unfortunate

unhappy in a sentence

• It is surprising how many unhappy marriages there are.
• There sure were a lot of unhappy people there on that day.
• We are never so happy nor so unhappy as we imagine.
• His unhappy childhood affected his outlook on life.
• These unhappy people must be taken good care of.

Example sentences from Tatoeba, licensed under CC BY 2.0 FR.

How to pronounce unhappy

unhappy is pronounced /ʌnˈhæpi/ in British English and /ənˈhæpi/ in American English. It has 3 syllables, with the stress on the second syllable.