thunderous
/ˈθʌn.dɚ.əs/adjective
thunderous is an adjective meaning “Very loud; that sounds like thunder; thundersome. Also in metaphorical expressions, signifying fury” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled T-H-U-N-D-E-R-O-U-S and has 3 syllables, and it appears about once in every 2 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).
What does thunderous mean?
adjective
- 1
Very loud; that sounds like thunder; thundersome. Also in metaphorical expressions, signifying fury.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce thunderous?
- UK /ˈθʌn.də.ɹəs/
- US /ˈθʌn.dɚ.əs/
- Australia /ˈθan.də.ɹəs/
Thunderous has 3 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-au-thunderous.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of thunderous
- more thunderous comparative
- most thunderous superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is thunderous?
Thunderous appears about once in every 2 million words in written English, the 38,416th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Thunderous in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense very loud; suggestive of thunder:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | tonitruant |
| German | donnernd |
| Spanish | tonante, tronitoso, atronador, atronante, tonitronante, tronitronante |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does thunderous come from?
From thunder + -ous.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).