a. | 1. | Exciting fear or apprehension; impressing dread; adapted to excite fear and deter from approach, encounter, or undertaking; alarming. |
Adj. | 1. | formidable - extremely impressive in strength or excellence; "a formidable opponent"; "the challenge was formidable"; "had a formidable array of compositions to his credit"; "the formidable army of brains at the Prime Minister's disposal" |
2. | formidable - inspiring fear; "the formidable prospect of major surgery"; "a tougher and more redoubtable adversary than the heel-clicking, jackbooted fanatic"- G.H.Johnston; "something unnerving and prisonlike about high gray wall" Synonyms: redoubtable, unnerving |