Difference Between

Bored vs Boring

Why is it that you are playing, you are singing, you are sleeping, but when you have something uninteresting happening around you, you are not boring but getting bored. This is where students learning English, especially those for whom it is a foreign language, become a bit confused. There are many such examples in English language, but we shall restrict ourselves to the difference between bored and boring for a while.

If you are watching a boring movie, you are not boring but getting bored. So, it is the movie that is boring and not you, who is boring. You feel bored, not boring like other ing verbs. But, if you are boring, (yes it is a valid usage) then other people do not wish to be around you. Look at following examples.

Martha bores Andy, so Andy is bored. Martha is boring. Thus, if Andy finds Martha uninteresting, he gets bored in her company and feels that Martha is a boring girl.

Actually, boring is not a verb like running, sleeping, playing, jumping, etc. It is an adjective that ends in ing and describes a person, object or a situation that causes a feeling. There are adjectives that end in ed and they describe ones’ own feelings. No one feels he is boring, but has this feeling about others. Is it is alright to say he or she is boring but not I. Instead, one uses the adjective with ed thus, describing one’s own feelings saying I am bored. ‘The lecture was so boring that half of the students were sleeping and even those who were awake were completely bored.