Etymologically
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English

nauseous

History

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈnɔːziːəs/, /ˈnɔːsiːəs/ (UK); /ˈnɔʃəs/ (US)[1]

Etymology

Formed from English nausea + -ous,[2] or borrowed from Latin nauseōsus.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

“Inclined to nausea, easily made queasy” (c. 1600), a sense now obsolete.[2][4]

Semantic evolution

The sense “causing nausea” followed in the 1610s,[2][4] and the figurative “loathsome, disgusting” by 1663.[4] According to Random House, the two literal senses, “causing nausea” and “affected with nausea”, both appeared in the early 17th century;[3] Wiktionary dates “affected with nausea” only from the 19th century.[1] Today nauseous is used mostly to mean “feeling sick”,[5][6] while in the sense “causing nausea” it is losing ground to nauseating.[5][3]

Timeline

  • 1604 – “inclined to nausea; squeamish”.[4]
  • 1612 – “causing nausea”.[4][5]
  • 1663 – figuratively, “loathsome, disgusting”.[4]
  • 1727 – of tastes and smells, “nasty, unpleasant”.[4]

Modern meaning

Adjective

  1. Feeling sick; affected with nausea.[6][5][3][1]
  2. Causing nausea; sickening, disgusting.[6][5][3][1]

Word family

  • nauseously
  • nauseousness

Related words

  • nausea
  • nauseate, nauseated, nauseating

Usage notes

Traditional critics hold that nauseous should mean only “causing nausea”, and that nauseated is correct for “feeling sick”;[6] 72 percent of the American Heritage Usage Panel preferred nauseated in Roller coasters make me nauseous.[6] Merriam-Webster calls this view mistaken, since nauseous is now most often used for “affected with nausea”, usually after verbs like feel.[5] The American Heritage Dictionary notes a subtle distinction: nauseated suggests a specific external cause, while nauseous describes a state whose cause may be unknown.[6]

References

  1. [1] [2] [3] [4] Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. [1] [2] [3] Harper, Douglas, Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  3. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  4. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  6. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Boston: Houghton Mifflin

Last edited on 5 October 2026.