dud

1 of 2

noun

ˈdəd 

1

duds plural

a

: clothing

b

: personal belongings

2

a

: one that is ineffectual

also : failure

a box-office dud

b

: misfit

3

: a bomb or missile that fails to explode

dud

2 of 2

adjective

: of little or no worth : valueless

dud checks

Synonyms

Noun

• bomb
• bummer
• bust
• catastrophe
• clinker
• clunker
• debacle
• débâcle
• disaster
• failure
• fiasco
• fizzle
• flop
• frost
• lemon
• loser
• miss
• shipwreck
• turkey
• washout

Examples of dud in a Sentence

Noun

The seeds must have been duds because the plants never grew.

She put on her new duds for the party.

Recent Examples on the Web

Noun

Doing just two — or sometimes three — live-action series a year should decrease the likelihood of ending up with a dud; keeping prices in line reduces the financial downside should one slip through anyway. —Josef Adalian, Vulture, 4 Nov. 2024

Out west, the defending NFC champion San Francisco 49ers put up another dud of a performance. —Vincent Frank, Forbes, 7 Oct. 2024

Adjective

After back-to-back losses— a dud performance and a choke job — San Francisco played a team wholly inferior in the New England Patriots. —Dieter Kurtenbach, The Mercury News, 29 Sep. 2024

Russian cluster munitions reportedly have a dud rate of as high as 40%. —Riley Rogerson, Anchorage Daily News, 21 July 2023

Word History

Etymology

Noun

Middle English dudde

First Known Use

Noun

1567, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Adjective

1899, in the meaning defined above

Kids Definition

dud

noun

ˈdəd

1

plural

a

: clothes sense 1

b

: personal belongings

2

: a complete failure

the movie was a dud

3

: a missile (as a bomb or shell) that fails to explode