Fearless means showing no fear at all. A fearless climber, fearless in the tackle, fearless reporting.
It is admiring, and it usually describes conduct rather than an inner state — somebody can be frightened and still act fearlessly, which is what most people mean by courage. Fearless journalism is a fixed phrase of praise. Note fearlessly; and that the more precise distinction is that fearless means feeling no fear and brave means acting despite it, though almost nobody observes it.
1adjectivefearlessShowing no fear at all.
“The fearless little girl climbed to the very top of the tree.”
synonyms: intrepid, dauntless
fearless is a quality of courage.
Proto-Indo-European
*per- — to go through, carry forth, try
Proto-Germanic
*fērō
Old English
fǣr
Middle English
feer
English
fear
English, today
fearless
Built from
From fear + -less. fear comes from Middle English feer, fere, fer (“fear”), from Old English fǣr, ġefǣr (“calamity, sudden danger, peril, sudden attack, terrible sight”), from Proto-Germanic fērō, fērą (“danger”), from Proto-Indo-European per- (“to go through, carry forth, try”). Cognate with Dutch gevaar (“danger, risk, peril”), German Gefahr (“danger, hazard, risk”), Danish fare (“danger, hazard, risk”), Faroese and Icelandic fár (“accident, anger, calamity”), Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk fare (“danger”), Swedish fara (“danger, risk, peril”), Latin perīculum (“danger, risk, trial”), Ancient Greek πεῖρα (“trial, experiment”), Armenian փորձ (“attempt”). a doublet of peril. The verb is from Middle English feren, from Old English fǣran (“to frighten, raven”), from the noun. Cognate with the archaic Dutch - verb varen (“to fear, to cause fear”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA