Meaning of sympathy in English

sympathy

noun

/ˈsɪm.pə.θi/ us

/ˈsɪm.pə.θi/

sympathy noun (UNDERSTANDING)

Add to word list Add to word list

B2 [ U ]

(an expression of) understanding and care for someone else's suffering:

The president has sent a message of sympathy to the relatives of the dead soldiers.

sympathy for I don't have much sympathy for her - I think she's brought her troubles on herself.

Compare

empathy

offer/send your sympathies formal

to express your sadness to someone because a relation or friend of theirs has recently died:

I went along to the funeral in order to offer my sympathies.

More examplesFewer examples

She said that she was deeply moved by all the letters of sympathy she had received.
I have absolutely no sympathy for people who get into debt by overspending.
George was a wonderful man - you have my greatest sympathy.
It's your own fault Colin, you'll get no sympathy from me!
I feel a lot of sympathy for him, it can't be easy bringing up three children on your own.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Sympathy & compassion

See more results »

sympathy noun (SUPPORT)

C2 [ U ]

support and agreement:

sympathy with I must confess I have some sympathy with his views.

sympathies [ plural ]

support:

sympathies are with Of those people questioned, 93 percent said their sympathies were with the teachers.

come out in sympathy with someone UK

to stop working in order to show your support for other workers who are on strike:

The railway workers came out in sympathy with the miners.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Accepting & agreeing

See more results »

(Definition of sympathy from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

sympathy | American Dictionary

sympathy

noun [ U ]

/ˈsɪm·pə·θi/

sympathy noun [U] (UNDERSTANDING)

Add to word list Add to word list

a feeling or expression of understanding and caring for someone else who is suffering or has problems that have caused unhappiness:

When Robert died, I sent a letter of sympathy to his wife.

sympathy noun [U] (SUPPORT)

a feeling or expression of support and agreement:

She tends to be in sympathy with the left wing of the party.

[ pl ] On the subject of wilderness, her sympathies were clearly pro-environmental.

(Definition of sympathy from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

sympathy | Business English

sympathy

noun [ C or U ]

/ˈsɪmpəθi/ us

Add to word list Add to word list

the act of showing understanding for someone or for a particular situation:

sympathy for sb The prime minister expressed his sympathy for those injured in the attacks.

have great/little/no sympathy for sth Locals have little sympathy for the chemical company following the toxic waste disaster.

come/walk out in sympathy

HR, WORKPLACE

to stop working in order to show your support for a group of workers who are on strike :

The airline's ground staff walked out in sympathy with catering contractors.

in sympathy

if prices on a market rise or go down in sympathy with others, they do this as a result of the others rising or going down:

Gilts advanced 23p in sympathy with the overnight rise in US treasury bonds.

(Definition of sympathy from the Cambridge Business English Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

Examples of sympathy

sympathy

The municipal president claimed that a 'demonstration of sympathies ' on the part of an agrarista regidor had given rise to the ' mutiny'.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Their moral imagination was constricted, their sympathies limited.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

One feels that he is hoarding his sympathies.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Subjective assessment of symptoms and signs means that often correct diagnosis relies on the awareness and sympathies of the attending healthcare professional.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

He tries, largely successfully, to provide an objective overview of both sides of the campaign, although-by his own admission-his sympathies are with those promoting protection.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The final two chapters discuss the application of his intellectual sympathies to contemporary affairs.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Indeed, this was part of her deliberate strategy to elicit the sympathies of the magazine-reading public.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Human sympathies are notoriously fickle and attach to all sorts of objects, both appropriate and inappropriate.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Accused of communist sympathies, he was imprisoned in 1976 for five years.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

His sympathies lie with the small congregations and the forms of activity undertaken by their membership.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Activists with pro-labour sympathies assumed advisory roles in key ministries.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

He was later renowned for his puritan sympathies.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Indeed, the classic dichotomy of "loyal minority" or "irredentist nationalist" fails to capture their competing and overlapping sympathies and interests.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The portrait thus conveyed is that of someone who began life with socialist sympathies, but was weaned off them by reasoned arguments.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Any natural philosophical strategy which excluded spirits and sympathies from its world was condemned as tending to subversion and irreligion.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

See all examples of sympathy

These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

Collocations with sympathy

sympathy

These are words often used in combination with sympathy.

Click on a collocation to see more examples of it.

a great deal of sympathy

There is a great deal of sympathy.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

a lot of sympathy

We have a lot of sympathy with the model.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

certain sympathy

Where widows might receive a certain sympathy or respect, or even both, spinsters were generally viewed with deep suspicion, whether young, ' life-cycle ', spinsters or older, ' lifelong ', single women.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

See all collocations with sympathy

What is the pronunciation of sympathy?