onerous

comparative more onerous · superlative most onerous

1. Imposing or constituting a physical, mental, or figurative load which can be borne only with effort; burdensome.

   [I]t has become an onerous duty, a wearisome and distasteful task.

   1910, Jack London, “The Golden Poppy”, in Revolution and Other Essays

   5 more examples

   That all this might not be too onerous on the purses of his rustic patrons, who are apt to consider the costs of schooling a grievous burden, and schoolmasters as mere drones, he had various ways of rendering himself both useful and agreeable.

   1820, Washington Irving, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

   Again, and more intensely than ever, she desired a fixed occupation,—no matter how onerous, how irksome.

   1849, Currer Bell [pseudonym; Charlotte Brontë], “Further Communications on Business”, in Shirley. A Tale. […], volume II, London: Smith, Elder and Co., […], →OCLC, page 45

   The striker's job was onerous, too, because there was so little "give" in the metal, and the perpetual jarring was indeed trying to the muscles.

   1945 January and February, A Former Pupil, “Some Memories of Crewe Works—III”, in Railway Magazine, page 13

   However, given current sensibilities about individual privacy and data protection, the recording of oral data is becoming increasingly onerous for researchers[.]

   2019, Li Huang, James Lambert, “Another Arrow for the Quiver: A New Methodology for Multilingual Researchers”, in Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, →DOI, page 11

   People with diabetes mellitus rely predominantly on finger pricking to measure blood levels of glucose, which can be onerous.

   2024 June, “A novel system for non-invasive measurement of blood levels of glucose”, in Nature Reviews Endocrinology, volume 20, →DOI, page 320

   Synonyms: burdensome, demanding, difficult, taxing, wearing