Informal British very tired; exhausted I'm knackered by the end of the day
Informal British severely damaged or broken he had seen Sonny flying around on a knackered old bike for the last two weeks
Verb
Informal British tire (someone) out this weekend has really knackered me
Informal British damage (something) severely I knackered my ankle playing on Sunday
late 16th century (originally denoting a harness-maker, then a slaughterer of horses): possibly from obsolete knack ‘trinket’. The word also had the sense ‘old worn-out horse’ (late 18th century). knacker (sense 2 of the noun) may be from dialect knacker ‘castanet’, from obsolete knack ‘make a sharp abrupt noise’, of imitative origin. It is unclear whether the verb represents a figurative use of ‘slaughter’, from knacker (sense 1 of the noun), or of ‘castrate’, from knacker (sense 2 of the noun)
Adjective
Similar Words: exhausted tired out worn out weary dog-tired bone-tired bone-weary ready to drop on one's last legs asleep on one's feet drained fatigued enervated debilitated spent jet-lagged out of breath breathless panting puffing puffed puffed out puffing and blowing gasping gasping for breath done in all in dead on one's feet beat dead beat shattered bushed fagged out knocked out wiped out running on empty zonked out worn to a frazzle frazzled bushwhacked whacked whacked out shagged out jiggered wabbit pooped tuckered out fried whipped gassed stonkered buggered rooted toilworn fordone
Opposites: fresh as a daisy raring to go
Similar Words: broken damaged faulty defective unsound not working not functioning non-functioning malfunctioning in disrepair inoperative out of commission out of order not in working order broken-down out of kilter down on the blink on its last legs kaput bust busted conked out acting up playing up gone haywire gone phut finished done for wonky dud duff buggered
Opposites: working fixed