1
botany
a
: a disease or injury of plants marked by the formation of lesions, withering, and death of parts (such as leaves and tubers)
potato blight
b
: an organism (such as an insect or a fungus) that causes blight
2
: something that frustrates plans or hopes
the blight of poverty
an abandoned factory that was a blight on the neighborhood
3
: something that impairs or destroys
… censorship … has brought under its blight Ireland's greatest poets, dramatists, and scholars.—
Paul Blanshard
Paul Blanshard4
: a deteriorated condition
urban blight
blighted; blighting; blights
1
botany
: to affect (a plant) with a disease or injury marked by the formation of lesions, withering, and death of parts (such as leaves and tubers) : to affect with blight (see blight entry 1 sense 1)
The apple trees were blighted by fungus.
2
: to impair the quality or effect of
the condition that has blighted his son's life—Patricia Guthrie
Patricia Guthrie
botany
: to suffer from or become affected with blight
The potatoes blighted.
Examples of blight in a Sentence
Noun
the city's spreading urban blight
the expanding urban sprawl is a blight on the countryside
Verb
Builders blighted the land with malls and parking lots.
Recent Examples on the Web
Randy Myers, The Mercury News, 7 Mar. 2025
In 2021, Hard Rock International opened a three-hundred-million-dollar casino just off one of Gary’s interstates, and later donated three million dollars to the city’s effort to eradicate blight.
—Paige Williams, The New Yorker, 10 Feb. 2025
Dessi Gomez, Deadline, 14 Feb. 2025
There is a sense that more can be drawn from the players at his disposal and that better results could naturally follow if senior players such as Trent Alexander-Arnold, Mohamed Salah, Curtis Jones and Szoboszlai avoid the injury disruptions that blighted their 2023-24 seasons.
—James Pearce, The Athletic, 23 July 2024
See All Example Sentences for blight
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Noun
Camozzi’s stark drama is steeped in truth and toughness, and effectively conveys the blight around Dani that’s threatening to swallow her whole.
—Randy Myers, The Mercury News, 7 Mar. 2025
In 2021, Hard Rock International opened a three-hundred-million-dollar casino just off one of Gary’s interstates, and later donated three million dollars to the city’s effort to eradicate blight.
—Paige Williams, The New Yorker, 10 Feb. 2025
Verb
Whereas Minnie feels like her whole life was slightly blighted by missing out on that name and that she has been cursed by bad luck.
—Dessi Gomez, Deadline, 14 Feb. 2025
There is a sense that more can be drawn from the players at his disposal and that better results could naturally follow if senior players such as Trent Alexander-Arnold, Mohamed Salah, Curtis Jones and Szoboszlai avoid the injury disruptions that blighted their 2023-24 seasons.
—James Pearce, The Athletic, 23 July 2024
See All Example Sentences for blight
Cite this Entry
“Blight.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/blight. Accessed 22 Mar. 2025.
Copy CitationKids Definition
blight
1 of 2 noun1
a
: a disease of plants marked by withering and death of parts (as leaves)
b
: an organism that causes blight
2
a
: something that harms or destroys
b
: a damaged or worsened condition
urban blight
blight
2 of 2 verb1
: to affect with blight
2
: to damage or worsen the quality or condition of
slums and blighted areas
3
: to suffer from or become affected with blight
Medical Definition
blight
noun
Australian
: an inflammation of the eye in which the eyelids discharge a thick mucous substance that often seals them up for days and minute granular pustules develop inside the lid
called also sandy blight
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