innocuous

innocuous

Audio pronunciation

 
adjective|ih-NAH-kyuh-wus
 
What It Means
 
Innocuous describes either something that is not likely to bother or offend anyone (as in “an innocuous comment”), or something that causes no injury, or is otherwise considered harmless (as in “an innocuous prank”).
 
// The reporter asked what seemed like an innocuous question, but it prompted the candidate to storm off, abruptly ending the press conference.
 
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Examples of INNOCUOUS
 
“Strong solar storms can be dangerous for astronauts in space, and can cause problems for GPS systems and satellites. ... But solar storms can also have more innocuous consequences on Earth, such as supercharged displays of the northern lights.” — Denise Chow, NBC News (online), May 15, 2025
 
 
Did You Know?
 
Innocuous is rooted in a lack of harm: it comes from the Latin adjective innocuus, which was formed by combining the negative prefix in- with a form of the verb noc;re, meaning “to harm” or “to hurt.” It first appeared in print in the early 1600s with the meaning “harmless; causing no injury,” as in “an innocuous gas,” and soon developed a second, metaphorical sense used to describe something that does not offend or cause hurt feelings, as in “an innocuous comment.” Innocent followed the same trajectory centuries before; its negative in- prefix joined with Latin nocent-, nocens, meaning “wicked,” which also comes from noc;re. This is not to say that noc;re has only contributed words that semantically negate the harm inherent in the root: noc;re is also the source of noxious and nuisance.