as in ruthless
having or showing a lack of sympathy or tender feelings
a hard-hearted brush-off to a homeless man asking for money
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Recent Examples of hard-hearted
Yet the very readiness with which the hard-hearted General Tilney believes this account suggests that he is used to reliable reports of other people’s wealth.
—
Literary Hub, 10 Sep. 2025
That makes perfect sense to all but the closed-minded or hard-hearted.
—Jim Newton, Mercury News, 27 June 2025
And each registered the other’s contention with the hard-hearted energy of her own physical craving.
—Jim Shepard, New Yorker, 8 June 2025
Joel, a hard-hearted smuggler, and Ellie, a headstrong teenager immune to the fungal pandemic that’s decimated the planet.
—Adam B. Vary, Variety, 5 Mar. 2025
Linda finds her own therapist (Conan O’Brien) insufferably hard-hearted; one of her own patients (Danielle Macdonald) gets ignored in a moment of crisis; a man named James (A$AP Rocky), the super at the motel, befriends her but gets little to show for it but insult and injury.
—Richard Brody, The New Yorker, 7 Feb. 2025
The hard-hearted treatment of men is on full display throughout Cecot.
—David Culver, CNN, 6 Nov. 2024
In the face of such terror, even hard-hearted Sam has to crumble.
—Kate Erbland, IndieWire, 27 June 2024
Technically Shaw is a mercenary, but not a cynical or hard-hearted one.
—Tom Gliatto, Peoplemag, 11 Feb. 2024
Recent Examples of Synonyms for hard-hearted
Adjective
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But he's drawn into a deadly Colombian drama involving a new ruthless arms dealer posing as a humanitarian, Teddy Dos Santos (Diego Calva), and Roxana (Camila Morrone), an American businesswoman.—
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As Iranians know well from 1979, ruthless contests tend to define revolutions.—
Adjective
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With a merciless 56-22 thumping of Oregon in the Peach Bowl, the Hoosiers punched their ticket to their first national championship game appearance in program history.—
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All the while, the president, his top advisers, and his public-affairs offices have pumped out rhetoric and imagery that celebrates the merciless, military-style pursuit of deportations.—
Adjective
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Without prosecutors empowered to bring charges against wrongdoers, judges willing to strike down overreach, legislators daring enough to demand investigations and change laws, and citizens outraged enough to protest, any revelations by journalists will fall on stony ground.—
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After that historic journey, NASA charted a new course toward Apophis, a stony metal-rich NEA that offers a sharp scientific contrast to Bennu's carbon-rich composition (and was once thought to pose a serious impact risk to Earth).—
Cite this Entry
“Hard-hearted.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/hard-hearted. Accessed 12 Jan. 2026.
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