Meanings
- colloquialnot comparable(A) hell of a; extreme.
They had a helluva row over where to spend the weekend.
2 more examples
Where were you? - Lost in Paris. - Wow! Helluva place to get lost!
Well, I got a Muppet News Flash for you, pal; it is possible for a three-year-old girl who loves to watch ducks and collect sea shells to feel bad, and then a bit worse, and then a whole helluva lot worse, and finally lousy in a way that requires machines and tubes and pills and catheters and before you know it you’re sitting in the front pew at good ol’ St. Fracis de Sales Church on Granville Street along with your wife and parents and inlaws and X-amount of your balding schoolboy chums listening to some second-rate organist eviscerate Bach’s “Sheep May Safely Graze”[…]
1999, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, volume 96, Fantasy House, page 151
Synonyms & antonyms
Origin
Written form of a reduction (relaxed pronunciation) of hell of a.
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Polish cholernie
- cholernievery, intense, intensely
Swedish sjujäkla, sjujävla
- sjujäklavery, intense, intensely
- sjujävlavery, intense, intensely
Cite this entry
helluva. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/helluva
“helluva.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/helluva. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “helluva,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/helluva.
Source: helluva on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.