Synonyms for sad

modified

1. Afflicted with sorrow

   unhappy, sorry, sorrowful, downcast, dismal, gloomy, glum, pensive, heavy-hearted, dispirited, dejected, depressed, desolate, troubled, melancholy, morose, grieved, pessimistic, melancholic, crushed, brokenhearted, heartbroken, heartsick, despondent, careworn, rueful, anguished, disheartened, lamenting, mourning, grieving, weeping, bitter, woebegone, doleful, spiritless, joyless, heavy, crestfallen, discouraged, moody, low-spirited, mesto (Italian), despairing, languishing, hopeless, worried, downhearted, cast down, in heavy spirits, morbid, oppressed, blighted, grief-stricken, foreboding, apprehensive, horrified, anxious, dolorous, triste (French), wretched, miserable, mournful, disconsolate, forlorn, saturnine, atrabilious, jaundiced, out of sorts, distressed, afflicted, bereaved, repining, harassed, dreary, bilious, lugubrious, woeful, in the doldrums*, down*, down in the dumps*, gone into mourning*, in bad humor*, out of humor*, cut up*, in the depths*, blue*, in grief*, making a long face*, bathed in tears*, feeling like hell*, down in the mouth*.

   Antonyms happy*, gay, cheerful.

2. Suggestive of sorrow

   pitiable, unhappy, dejecting, saddening, disheartening, discouraging, dispiriting, joyless, dreary, dark, dismal, gloomy, poignant, moving, touching, mournful, lachrymose, disquieting, disturbing, dimming, somber, doleful, oppressive, funereal, discomposing, lugubrious, pathetic, tragic, pitiful, piteous, woeful, rueful, sorry, unfortunate, hapless, heart-rending, dire, distressing, depressing, grievous.

3. *Inferior

   cheap, bad, second-class; see common 1, poor 2.

sad is the simple, general term, ranging in implication from a mild, momentary unhappiness to a feeling of intense grief; sorrowful implies a sadness caused by some specific loss, disappointment, etc. her death left him sorrowful; melancholy suggests a more or less chronic mournfulness or gloominess, or, often, merely a wistful pensiveness melancholy thoughts about the future; dejected implies discouragement or a sinking of spirits, as because of frustration; depressed suggests a mood of brooding despondency, as because of fatigue or a sense of futility the novel left him feeling depressed; doleful implies a mournful, often lugubrious, sadness the doleful look on a lost child's face