saccharine
Americanadjective
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of the nature of or resembling that of sugar.
a powdery substance with a saccharine taste.
-
containing or yielding sugar.
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very sweet to the taste; sugary.
a saccharine dessert.
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cloyingly agreeable or ingratiating.
a saccharine personality.
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exaggeratedly sweet or sentimental.
a saccharine smile; a saccharine song of undying love.
adjective
-
excessively sweet; sugary
a saccharine smile
-
of, relating to, of the nature of, or containing sugar or saccharin
Other Word Forms
- nonsaccharine adjective
- nonsaccharinity noun
- saccharinely adverb
- saccharinity noun
- unsaccharine adjective
Etymology
Origin of saccharine
Explanation
You might be tempted to turn the radio dial when you hear a love song that is saccharine, meaning that it’s too sweet and sentimental to bear. The adjective saccharine comes from the Middle Latin word for sugar. Saccharine is a type of sugar substitute that you might sprinkle on your cereal or berries to sweeten them without the calories of real sugar. The word is used to describe something so sweet that it’s annoying — like a very sentimental song or a tear-jerking commercial.
Vocabulary lists containing saccharine
Sickly Sweet Treats: Sappy and Insincere Valentine Words
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For Grilled Cheese Day, Vocab with a Twist
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Pie Chart: Dessert Words
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The follow-up continues this kookiness with a madhouse spoof of Hallmark holiday saccharine in which a woodpile becomes a homicidal monster.
From Salon • Dec. 18, 2025
So are saccharine dishes like the cranberry orange relish that Michael Donnelly-Boylen sweetened with long pours of sugar into a food processor.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 26, 2025
First, good on Mazzulla to straight-up treat the kid as the reporter he clearly is, and answer the question directly, without pandering or turning it into some sort of saccharine after-school special.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 21, 2025
But don't expect saccharine stories of romance - this is Welsh, after all.
From BBC • Jul. 10, 2025
The queue edged forward till Winston was almost at the counter, then was held up for two minutes because someone in front was complaining that he had not received his tablet of saccharine.
From "1984" by George Orwell
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
