Ludicrous means so ridiculous or absurd that it's almost laughable. When something is ludicrous, it's so far from making sense that you can barely believe it's happening.

If your teacher assigned 500 math problems for homework tonight, due tomorrow morning, you might call that assignment ludicrous. It's so extreme that it crosses into absurdity. When a movie shows someone surviving a fall from an airplane by landing in a swimming pool, that's ludicrous: physically impossible and ridiculous.

You'll hear people say things like “That's a ludicrous claim!” when someone makes a statement that's obviously false or exaggerated. A ludicrous price might be $10,000 for a pencil. A ludicrous excuse might be “my homework was eaten by a dinosaur.”

Unlike words like “funny” or “silly,” ludicrous carries a tone of disbelief or criticism. When you call something ludicrous, you're pointing out that it's so wrong that it strains credibility. The word helps you express that special feeling when something goes beyond ordinary foolishness into the territory of the truly preposterous.