WordWeb Online

1. Lacking in liveliness or animation
   "he was so dull at parties"; "a dull political campaign"; "a large dull impassive man"; "dull days with nothing to do"; "how dull and dreary the world is"; "fell back into one of her dull moods";
   - hebetudinous [rare]
    
2. Emitting or reflecting very little light
   "a dull glow"; "dull silver badly in need of a polish"; "a dull sky"
    
3. Not keenly felt
   "a dull throbbing"; "dull pain"
    
4. Not having a sharp edge or point
   "the knife was too dull to be of any use"
    
5. Being or made softer or less loud or clear
   "the dull boom of distant breaking waves";
   - muffled, muted, softened
    
6. So lacking in interest as to cause mental weariness
   "a dull play"; "his competent but dull performance";
   - boring, deadening, ho-hum [informal], irksome, slow, tedious, tiresome, wearisome, unamusing, deadly [informal], draggy [informal], mind-numbing
    
7. (of colour) very low in saturation; highly diluted
   "dull greens and blues"
    
8. Taking more than usual time to learn or understand; lacking intellectual acuity
   "although dull at classical learning, at mathematics he was uncommonly quick";
   - dense, dim [informal], dumb, obtuse, slow
    
9. (of business) not active or brisk
   "business is dull";
   - slow, sluggish
    
10. Blunted in responsiveness or sensibility
    "a dull gaze"; "so exhausted she was dull to what went on about her"
     
11. Not clear and resonant; sounding as if striking with or against something relatively soft
    "the dull thud";
    - thudding
     
12. Darkened with overcast
    "a dull sky";
    - leaden

1. Make dull in appearance
   "Age had dulled the surface"
    
2. Become dull or lusterless in appearance; lose shine or brightness
   "the varnished table top dulled with time"
    
3. Deaden (a sound or noise), especially by wrapping
   - muffle, mute, damp, dampen, tone down
    
4. Make numb or insensitive
   "The shock dulled her senses";
   - numb, benumb, blunt
    
5. Make dull or blunt
   "Too much cutting dulls the knife's edge";
   - blunt
    
6. Become less interesting or attractive
   - pall
    
7. Make less lively or vigorous
   "Middle age dulled her appetite for travel"

Derived forms: dullest, dulling, duller, dulls, dulled

See also: arid, blunt, blunted, bovine, brightness, brightness level, cloudy, colorless [US], colourless [Brit, Cdn], deadened, desiccate, desiccated, drab, dreary, dulled, dullness, edgeless, flat, heavy, humdrum, inactive, insensitive, lackluster [US], lacklustre [Brit, Cdn], lame, lameo [informal], leaden, light, luminance, luminosity, luminousness, lusterless [N. Amer], lustreless [Brit, Cdn], mat, matt, matte, matted, meh [informal], monotonous, monotonousness, nonresonant, samey [Brit, informal], soft, spiritless, stupid, subdued, unanimated, uninspiring, uninteresting, unpolished, unreverberant, unsaturated, unsharpened

Type of: alter, change, desensitise [Brit], desensitize, modify, soften, weaken

Antonym: bright, lively, sharp, sharpen

Encyclopedia: Dull, Perthshire