Arid means so dry that little will grow. An arid landscape, arid climate, arid and empty.
In climate classification it is a defined band: arid regions get very little rain and lose more to evaporation than they receive, which is what makes them deserts. Figuratively an arid discussion is dry in the other sense — barren and without interest. Note that the Latin means parched, from a verb meaning to be dry.
1adjectivearidSo dry that little will grow.
“Few plants can survive in the arid desert, where it hardly ever rains.”
arid is a quality of dryness.
Latin aridus comes from arere, to be dry. Ardent, from burning, comes from a related root.
Proto-Indo-European
*h₂eHs-
French
aride
English, today
arid
Built from
From French aride. From French aride or directly from Latin āridus (“dry, arid, parched”), compare its synonymous contracted form ardus. Originally from the verb āreo (“to be dry, to be parched”), akin to ārdeō (“to be on fire, to burn”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA