What's the difference between handsome and pretty?

Handsome


Definition:

  • (superl.) Dexterous; skillful; handy; ready; convenient; -- applied to things as persons.
  • (superl.) Agreeable to the eye or to correct taste; having a pleasing appearance or expression; attractive; having symmetry and dignity; comely; -- expressing more than pretty, and less than beautiful; as, a handsome man or woman; a handsome garment, house, tree, horse.
  • (superl.) Suitable or fit in action; marked with propriety and ease; graceful; becoming; appropriate; as, a handsome style, etc.
  • (superl.) Evincing a becoming generosity or nobleness of character; liberal; generous.
  • (superl.) Ample; moderately large.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) He campaigned for a no vote and won handsomely, backed by more than 61%, before performing a striking U-turn on Thursday night, re-tabling the same austerity terms he had campaigned to defeat and which the voters rejected.
  • (2) "The company and its shareholders have been handsomely rewarded for that."
  • (3) My son was born healthy, strong and very handsome, in spite of his dangerous start.
  • (4) It just seems a bit of a waste, I say, given that he's young and handsome and famous.
  • (5) Miklos Haraszti, whom I encountered in Budapest, had the looks of a small Spanish grandee in some Velázquez painting; dark, unnervingly handsome, serene.
  • (6) I thought Mark was perfect: smart, romantic (he wrote me love notes in year 9 French) and quite handsome.
  • (7) It's actually very taboo to stop and say, "OK, I'm in a band and I'm really successful and my boyfriend's a pop star and he's really handsome and lots of girls fancy him, but I don't want to be with him."
  • (8) Reith, “his dour handsome face scarred like that of a villain in a melodrama”, was “a strange shepherd for such a mixed, bohemian flock … he had under his aegis a bevy of ex-soldiers, ex-actors, ex-adventurers which … even a Dartmoor prison governor might have had difficulty in controlling”.
  • (9) Moyes's plan for Carrick and Marouane Fellaini to "tag-team" West Ham's striker worked handsomely and Carroll's only moment of threat came after 15 minutes, when he headed straight at David de Gea.
  • (10) In this life,” he said, smiling, “you have to make some money.” He then spelled out the cartel’s proposition: it would pay Sirleaf handsomely in exchange for his help in using Liberia as a transit hub for smuggling cocaine from Colombia into Europe.
  • (11) And he adds: “Women usually vote for the more handsome man.” Asked how German chancellor Angela Merkel had come to power in a country where women vote, he changed the topic to sports teams coached by men.
  • (12) I see a small group strolling along, a tall, handsome man at the centre.
  • (13) Some art historians thought Leighton was gay – his handsome friend, the Italian painter Giovanni Costa, was the only guest recorded as staying overnight – while others believed he never had a lover of either sex.
  • (14) A handsome pair of strippedback brick apartment buildings will frame a forthcoming bridge across the river, leading to a woodland park beyond.
  • (15) To wit: the near offence taken when speculation first surfaced that Stewart was dating Cargile – what an absurd decision given that she used to go out with the handsome, perfectly stubbled Robert Pattinson, right?
  • (16) One Saturday afternoon in September 1954, a handsome, faintly smiling god looked up from the London mud.
  • (17) SNL finally paid off handsomely, but in a delayed-reaction sort of way."
  • (18) While some of its outreach involved active image management, some parts were pragmatic, such as its offer of handsome salaries for engineers able to maintain the oil fields on which Isis relies for black-market income.
  • (19) The handsome finish went high past the left hand of Víctor Valdés.
  • (20) Among MME, youthfulness, handsomeness, and sexiness are important, promoting versatility in place of specificity when mentioning sexual acts.

Pretty


Definition:

  • (superl.) Pleasing by delicacy or grace; attracting, but not striking or impressing; of a pleasing and attractive form a color; having slight or diminutive beauty; neat or elegant without elevation or grandeur; pleasingly, but not grandly, conceived or expressed; as, a pretty face; a pretty flower; a pretty poem.
  • (superl.) Moderately large; considerable; as, he had saved a pretty fortune.
  • (superl.) Affectedly nice; foppish; -- used in an ill sense.
  • (superl.) Mean; despicable; contemptible; -- used ironically; as, a pretty trick; a pretty fellow.
  • (superl.) Stout; strong and brave; intrepid; valiant.
  • (adv.) In some degree; moderately; considerably; rather; almost; -- less emphatic than very; as, I am pretty sure of the fact; pretty cold weather.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) As a Native American I am pretty sensitive to charges of racism and white supremacy,” the Oklahoma congressman added.
  • (2) Not making a sound for 24 hours pretty nearly killed me.
  • (3) The conclusion is to warn the orthopaedic surgeons to look carefully what model is behind the pretty coloured results.
  • (4) It may unsettle Exxon Mobil a little but they are pretty experienced now and I don’t think they would derail anything,” she said.
  • (5) United and West Ham are on similar runs and can feel pretty happy about themselves but are not as confident away from home as they are at home and that will have to change if they are to make ground on the top teams.
  • (6) When you hear the name Jesus, is the first image that comes to mind a dewy-eyed pretty boy with flowing locks?
  • (7) We’ve got a lot of work to do but I’m feeling pretty confident.
  • (8) Some offer a range, depending on whether you think you're a bit of a buff, and know a pinot meunier from a pinot noir and what prestige cuvée actually means or you just want to see a bit of the process and have a nice glass of bubbly at the end of it, before moving on to the next place – touring a pretty corner of France getting slowly, and delightfully, fizzled.
  • (9) No one condones what happened in the 70s, but I think this is pretty appalling."
  • (10) Which is good news for anyone who likes this kind of thing (which is, let's face it, pretty much everyone.
  • (11) Woodall added: “Pretty much everything [is a potential source for what we found].
  • (12) There's no doubt Twitter is, for those who are into that kind of thing, a first-class social networking medium (the proof: pretty much every other social networking site, including Facebook, has tried to buy it and, having failed, adopted a whole raft of blatantly Twitter-like features of their own).
  • (13) Pretty much every major toy brand, as well as apps like Angry Birds and Talking Friends, are spawning “webisodes” on YouTube as well as traditional ads, which often sit side-by-side within the same channel.
  • (14) She said the UK law on assisted suicide infringed Pretty's human rights, under article two of the European convention – the right to life.
  • (15) Facebook Twitter Pinterest Terms and Conditions May Apply – trailer It’s pretty simple, really.
  • (16) Parties are a tedious chore, while sponsorships are pretty tiresome too: can you remember the key messaging about that motor oil you agreed to plug to the nearest reporter?
  • (17) Chelsea might recover under similar circumstances, but I reckon they need a pretty big overhaul.
  • (18) I’ve seen Ukip both at home and abroad, and I’m sorry to say they’re pretty amateur.
  • (19) "I have always been of the view that it is a false dichotomy, and one that is pretty much built-in by our education system unfortunately," he said this weekend.
  • (20) Facebook Twitter Pinterest A bus belching smoke in Bogotá Pretty dirty.