What's the difference between
and
Enter two words to compare and contrast their definitions, origins, and synonyms to better understand how those words are related.

Terror vs Terrify - What's the difference?

terror | terrify |

As a noun terror

is (uncountable) intense dread, fright, or fear.

As a verb terrify is

to frighten greatly; to fill with terror.

terror

English

Alternative forms

* terrour (obsolete or hypercorrect)

Noun

  • (uncountable) Intense dread, fright, or fear.
  • (countable) Specific instance of being intensely terrified.
  • * 1794 , (William Godwin),
  • The terrors with which I was seizedwere extreme.
  • (uncountable) The action or quality of causing dread; terribleness, especially such qualities in narrative fiction.
  • * 1921', (Edith Birkhead), ''The tale of '''terror : a study of the Gothic romance
  • (countable) Something or someone that causes such fear.
  • * 1841 , (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
  • The terrors of the storm
  • *
  • , title= Mr. Pratt's Patients, chapter=1 , passage=A chap named Eleazir Kendrick and I had chummed in together the summer afore and built a fish-weir and shanty at Setuckit Point, down Orham way. For a spell we done pretty well. Then there came a reg'lar terror of a sou'wester same as you don't get one summer in a thousand, and blowed the shanty flat and ripped about half of the weir poles out of the sand.}}

    Derived terms

    * terrorism * terrorist * terrorize, terrorized, terrorizing * reign of terror

    See also

    * alarm * fright * consternation * dread * dismay

    terrify

    English

    Alternative forms

    * terrifie (obsolete)

    Verb

    (en-verb)
  • To frighten greatly; to fill with terror.
  • To menace or intimidate.
  • (obsolete) To make terrible.
  • Synonyms

    * See also