shabby

Adjective Satellite

showing signs of wear and tear
- "shabby furniture"
mean and unworthy and despicable
- "shabby treatment"

Adj

Of clothing, a place, etc.: unkempt and worn or otherwise in poor condition due to age or neglect; scruffy.
Of a person: wearing ragged or very worn, and often dirty, clothing.
Of a person, their behaviour, etc.: despicable, mean; also, not generous; stingy, tight-fisted.
Poor in quality; also, showing little effort or talent.
Of the pulse: thready, weak.
Poor in quality; also, showing little effort or talent.
Of weather: wet and dreary.
Poor in quality; also, showing little effort or talent.
Chiefly of sheep: affected by shab or scab (“a skin disease”); scabby.
Poor in quality; also, showing little effort or talent.

Verb

To make (something) shabby (adjective sense 1); to shabbify.
To become shabby; to shabbify.

Adjective

In poor condition from long use or neglect; ragged.

Examples

Despite its SHABBY appearance, the old Scrabble set still delivered intense gameplay.
His painting is not too shabby.
shabby treatment
The fellow arrived looking rather shabby after journeying so far.
They lived in a tiny apartment, with some old, shabby furniture.

Origin / Etymology

The adjective is derived from shab (“(obsolete except UK, dialectal) scaly skin disease; skin disease of sheep; crust forming over wound, scab”) + -y (suffix meaning ‘having the quality of’ forming adjectives).
The verb is derived from the adjective.
Cognates
* Dutch schabbig (“poor, needy, shabby”)
* Middle High German schebic (modern German schäbig (“shabby”))
* Middle Low German schabbich (“miserable”) (modern Low German schabbig, schäbbig)
* Scots shabby (“in poor health, ill”)
* Swedish sjabbig (“shabby, mangy, scruffy”), skabbig (“scabby”)

Synonyms

moth-eaten, ratty, tatty, as tight as Dick's hatband, beat, beat up, beaten up, bedraggled, broken-down, cheap, cheeseparing, chintzy, clapped out, close, close as wax, close-fisted, crumbling, damaged, decrepit, defective, derelict, deteriorated, dilapidated, draggled, effete, faulty, illiberal, mean, miserable, miserly, munted, narrow-fisted, neglected, niggardly, nipcheese, outworn, parsimonious, passé, peddling, penny-pinching, penny-wise, penurious, raddled, ragged, ramshackle, ravaged, rinky-dink, ruinous, run-down, scrooge-like, scrubby, seedy, shabby, still got one's communion money, stingy, swear, tatterdemalion, tight, tight as a tick, tight-fisted, tighter than Dick's hatband, timeworn, tired, tumbledown, ungenerous, ungiving, unimproved, wasted, weakened, worn, worn-out, worsened, wrecked, wrecksome

Scrabble Score: 16

shabby: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Word
shabby: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
shabby: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary

Words With Friends Score: 16

shabby: valid Words With Friends Word