Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. adj. Marked by a lack of sleep: a sleepless night.
  2. adj. Unable to sleep.
  3. adj. Always alert or active; never resting: a sleepless district of the city.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. Being without sleep; wakeful.
  2. Constantly watchful; vigilant: as, the sleepless eye of justice.
  3. Restless; continually disturbed or agitated.

Wiktionary

  1. adj. Characterized by an absence of sleep.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. adj. Having no sleep; wakeful.
  2. adj. Having no rest; perpetually agitated.

WordNet 3.0

  1. adj. always watchful
  2. adj. experiencing or accompanied by sleeplessness

Examples

  • “Likewise, standing shackled and sleepless is not torture if the duration is short, but it is torture when the duration is 180 hours.”

    The Volokh Conspiracy » More on Liz Cheney

  • “Certainly Aftermath took its toll in sleepless nights.”

    A Conversation with Peter Robinson

  • “But in so many married women sleeplessness and a consequent nervous condition are coupled with a lack of the complete sex relation, that one of the first questions a physician should put to those of his women patients who are worn and sleepless is whether her husband really fulfills his marital duty in their physical relation.”

    Married Love: or, Love in Marriage

  • “At the moment she had felt that his casual words held a hidden meaning, and to this day, though she had pondered them in sleepless nights ever since, she was still undecided.”

    The Miller of Old Church

  • “I was a little shaver, but recall the sleepless nights my parents never slept, worring about loosing our home and farm.”

    Some Political Notes

  • “By "sleepless" I mean I was only able to sleep eight hours as opposed to my usual ten and half.”

    Yoink! Another Fixed-Gear Vanished

  • “The president is sleeping comfortably in Crawford, Texas, tonight," Dean said, speaking to thousands at the rally on Saturday, "but there are an awful lot of Americans who are kind of sleepless these days -- they're sleepless about wondering where their job went.”

    THE NEWS BLOG

  • “They don't see the sleepless nights, the legal bills, and the freezer full of lean cuisines.”

    The Huffington Post: I Don't Want Your Husband. No. Really!

  • “Even among those who spent sleepless nights on Mr. Yeltsin's barricades, few today can name all three men.”

    The Wall Street Journal: New Russia Turns 20, Its Martyrs Forgotten

  • “Returning Sunday night from the Academy screening of the fabulous Fox/Peter Chernin film, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, I was sleepless and distraught at the effect the film had upon me.”

    The Huffington Post: Jay Weston: Do Monkeys Make Good Pets?

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‘sleepless’ has been looked up 667 times, added to 9 lists, and has a Scrabble score of 11.