innocuous

adjective

in·​noc·​u·​ous i-ˈnä-kyə-wəs 

1

: producing no injury : harmless

2

: not likely to give offense or to arouse strong feelings or hostility : inoffensive, insipid

innocuously adverb

innocuousness noun

Did you know?

Look at the Prefix to Define Innocuous

Innocuous has harmful roots – it comes to us from the Latin adjective innocuus, which was formed by combining the negative prefix in- with a form of the verb nocēre, meaning "to harm" or "to hurt." In addition, nocēre is related to the truly "harmful" words noxious, nocent, and even nocuous. Innocent is from nocēre as well, although like innocuous it has the in- prefix negating the hurtful possibilities. Innocuous first appeared in print in the early 17th century with the clearly Latin-derived meaning "harmless or causing no injury" (as in "an innocuous gas"). The second sense is a metaphorical extension of the idea of injury, used to indicate that someone or something does not cause hurt feelings, or even strong feelings ("an innocuous book" or "innocuous issues," for example).

Synonyms

• anodyne
• benign
• harmless
• hurtless
• innocent
• inoffensive
• safe
• white

Examples of innocuous in a Sentence

Gossip is a relatively innocuous manifestation; fashioning one's self as eternally battling a white America mired in "racism" is a more noisome one. —John McWhorter, Wall Street Journal, 17 Sept. 2003

Small and innocuous looking, the habanero is uncontested as the hottest pepper in the world, the mother of all peppers. —Jim Robbins, Smithsonian, January 1992

And there was LeRoy … a somewhat gruesome but innocuous neighborhood dimwit who gave me the creeps when he sat down on the front stoop to listen to a bunch of us talking after school. —Philip Roth, New York Times Book Review, 18 Oct. 1987

The salamander, an innocuous amphibian like a big newt, was also regarded with a mixture of horror and awe. —David Attenborough, The First Eden, 1987

He told a few innocuous jokes.

those innocuous lies we must tell every day if society is to remain civil

Recent Examples on the Web

The tension begins with a seemingly innocuous scene of Hal walking through a warren of cubicles at the CIA headquarters, on his way for an official U.S. government call to explain the VP’s role in the bombing. —Mark Peikert, IndieWire, 4 Nov. 2024

The term may make the mistakes seem almost innocuous, but in some applications, even a minuscule error rate can have severe ramifications. —Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 1 Nov. 2024

Such innocuous forms of teenage rebellion as heavy metal fandom or Dungeons & Dragons could get a kid branded a cultist—if not a murderer. —Judy Berman, TIME, 30 Oct. 2024

While many overtly threaten violence against the young athlete, others appear innocuous: gifs of Afghan cricketers, left without comment on many of Hamidi’s posts, seemingly with no relevance to the post’s content. —Joseph Ataman, CNN, 13 Oct. 2024

Word History

Etymology

Latin innocuus, from in- + nocēre — see innocent entry 1

First Known Use

1631, in the meaning defined at sense 1

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Kids Definition

innocuous

adjective

in·​noc·​u·​ous in-ˈäk-yə-wəs 

1

: producing no injury : harmless

an innocuous gas

2

: not likely to bother anyone : inoffensive

made a few innocuous jokes

innocuously adverb

innocuousness noun

Medical Definition

innocuous

adjective

in·​noc·​u·​ous in-ˈäk-yə-wəs 

: producing no injury : not harmful

innocuously adverb