- (forming adjectives) full of or characterized by: painful, spiteful, restful
- (forming adjectives) able or tending to: helpful, useful
- (forming nouns) indicating as much as will fill the thing specified: mouthful, spoonful
WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2026
Ful
(fŏŏl),USA pronunciation n., pl. Fuls, (esp. collectively) Ful.
-ful,
WordReference Random House Learner's Dictionary of American English © 2026- Language VarietiesFulani.
-ful,
- Pronounsa suffix meaning "full of,'' "characterized by'' (shameful;
beautiful;
careful;
thoughtful);
"tending to,'' "able to'' (wakeful;
harmful);
"as much as will fill'' (spoonful).
- Middle English, Old English -full, -ful, representing full, ful full1
- The plurals of nouns ending in -ful are usually formed by adding -s to the suffix:two cupfuls; two scant teaspoonfuls.Perhaps influenced by the phrase in which a noun is followed by the adjective full (both arms full of packages), some speakers and writers pluralize such nouns by adding -s before the suffix:two cupsful.
-ful, suffix.
- Pronouns
- -ful is attached to nouns to form adjectives with the meaning "full of;
characterized by'':beauty + -ful → beautiful (= full of beauty);care + -ful → careful (= characterized by care). - -ful is attached to verbs to form adjectives with the meaning "tending to;
able to'':harm + -ful → harmful (= tending to harm);wake + -ful→ wakeful (= tending to stay awake). - -ful is attached to nouns to form nouns with the meaning "as much as will fill'':spoon + -ful → spoonful (= as much as will fill a spoon);cup + -ful → cupful (= as much as will fill a cup).
- -ful is attached to nouns to form adjectives with the meaning "full of;
Collins Concise English Dictionary © HarperCollins Publishers::
-ful suffix Where the amount held by a spoon, etc, is used as a rough unit of measurement, the correct form is spoonful, etc: take a spoonful of this medicine every day. Spoon full is used in a sentence such as he held out a spoon full of dark liquid, where full of describes the spoon. A plural form such as spoonfuls is preferred by many speakers and writers to spoonsful
'Ful' also found in these entries (note: many are not synonyms or translations):
awful
- bashful
- foul
- -ful
- grateful
- t.
- tbs.
- aid
- aim
- armful
- artful
- avenge
- bagful
- baleful
- baneful
- barrelful
- basketful
- beautiful
- bellyful
- blameful
- blissful
- blithe
- blush
- boastful
- bottleful
- bountiful
- bowlful
- boxful
- brimful
- bucketful
- bushelful
- canful
- capful
- careful
- carful
- chanceful
- changeful
- characterful
- chargeful
- cheerful
- chock-full
- closetful
- coch. amp.
- coch. mag.
- coch. med.
- coch. parv.
- colorful
- cupful
- dareful
- deathful