The word gratificante in Italian can translate as rewarding, gratifying, satisfying or fulfilling. It is almost always used in reference to a job, activity or relationship that provides satisfaction and pleasure.
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Gratificante comes from the verb gratificare meaning to be rewarding or to be gratifying, but also to compensate when talking about money.
Gratificante is one of those adjectives whose form only changes for the plural, not for the gender. For example:
- un lavoro gratificante (masculine, singular)
- un’attività gratificante (feminine, singular)
- dei lavori gratificanti (masculine, plural)
- delle attività gratificanti (feminine, plural)
Finalmente ho trovato un lavoro gratificante che mi rende felice.
I’ve finally found a rewarding job that makes me happy.
To say that something isn’t rewarding, you can use the expressions scarsamente gratificante, poco gratificante or more simply, non gratificante.
Lavorare per quell’azienda è poco gratificante, però almeno mi danno tanti giorni di ferie.
It’s not very rewarding working for that company, but at least they give me a lot of days off.
Additionally, you can use the antonyms deludente (disappointing), insoddisfacente (unsatisfying) or frustrante (frustrating).
On the other hand, two possible synonyms for our word of the day are appagante and soddisfacente.
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Heather Broster is a graduate with honours in linguistics from the University of Western Ontario. She is an aspiring polyglot, proficient in English and Italian, as well as Japanese, Welsh, and French to varying degrees of fluency. Originally from Toronto, Heather has resided in various countries, notably Italy for a period of six years. Her primary focus lies in the fields of language acquisition, education, and bilingual instruction.
