harmless
/ˈhɑːmləs
/adjective
1Not able or likely to cause harm: the venom of most spiders is harmless to humans...
- Donating blood is harmless to the donor and yet gives a gift of life to a dying person.
- It can cause nausea and, in extreme cases, death in humans, but is harmless to marine life.
- The tope shark is considered harmless to humans because of its small size and its preference for small prey items.
Synonyms
safe, innocuous, benign, gentle, mild, wholesome, non-dangerous, non-toxic, non-poisonous, non-irritant, non-addictive
rare innoxious
1.1Inoffensive: as an entertainer, he’s pretty harmless...
- I agreed, breathing a sigh of relief that his request seemed to be innocent and harmless enough.
- We've got better things to do than to try and distort what is now a harmless nickname.
- And of course we should continue to take these awful, embarrassing and harmless photos.
Synonyms
inoffensive, innocuous, unobjectionable, unexceptionable, unoffending, tame, gentle
Derivatives
harmlessness
/ noun ...- A lot of churches seem to make it their main job to assert their own harmlessness, advertising a ‘safe, accepting environment’.
- But in the buzzing reality of daily life, bees collect from hundreds of types of plants, so whatever toxins they pick up are diluted to the point of harmlessness.
- Interestingly, the premise that marijuana is harmless because it's just a plant could also be used to explain the harmlessness of cocaine and heroin.