Words / C2

in-SIP-id/ɪnˈsɪpɪd/

Insipid means lacking flavour, interest, or liveliness: an insipid plot, insipid soup. Bland is everyday; dull is close; flavourless is literal. In speech, bland or lifeless is enough. It is a critic’s word — of food, prose, and people. Do not use it for something you merely disagree with; insipid is absence of taste, not presence of error.

Meaning

Lacking flavour, interest, or liveliness.

Examples

• “The plot was insipid and easy to forget.”
• “The second half was insipid: competent, forgettable, and oddly proud of both.”
• “Insipid tea arrived in a pretentious pot; the problem was the brew, not the china.”

Good to know

Dull and flavourless. Everyday: bland. Of food, art, character. Absence of life, not a synonym for wrong.

Near in meaning

bland

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