Standard Lemma guide

fourth-rate

adj · noun · 3 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

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Pronunciation

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1

adj

Meaning 1

Of a Royal Navy ship of the line in the Napoleonic Era: having 50–60 guns across two gun decks, a complement of 320–420, and weighing approximately 1,000 tons burthen.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Usage: UK, historical, not-comparable

Topics: government, military, nautical, politics, transport, war

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

2

adj

Meaning 2

Terrible, awful; less than third-rate.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Usage: idiomatic, not-comparable, uncommon

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: dismal, horrible, rubbish, abysmal, atrocious, awful, bad, chronic, coarse, corny, crap, crapalicious, crappy, crummy, deityforsaken, dire, disagreeable, dogshit, dreadful, fifth-rate, foul, fourth-rate, godawful, hellish, hideous, hopeless, horrendous, horrid, horrific, inadequate, incompetent, inelegant, intolerable, inferior, lackluster, loathsome, lousy, miserable, naff, negative, odious, ordinary, pathetic, peak, piss-poor, rotten, shitawful, shitty, sixth-rate, sloppy, subpar, terrible, unfavorable, wack, ass, base, below par, bottom-shelf, BTEC, bum, cheap, cheap and nasty, cheapshit, cheesy, chintzy, coffee-and, crappo, craptastic, crapperific, craptabulous, craptacular, cruddy, dogwater, drecky, flimsy, gash, garbage, god-awful, low, low-grade, low-quality, low-rent, made in China, mid, naughty, one-star, poor, poor man's, pound-shop, punk, rinky-dink, ropy, sad, schlocky, scrubby, second-rate, shoddy, slazy, slight, slim, shit, shite, substandard, ticky-tacky, tenth-rate, third-rate, tin-pot, trash, trashy, under par, woeful, wretched

Antonyms: none provided

3

noun

Meaning 3

A fourth-rate ship of the line.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Usage: UK, historical

Topics: government, military, nautical, politics, transport, war

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

No etymology was provided for this word.

Real reading context

fourth-rate in complete knowledge articles