1
as in encroaches
to advance gradually beyond the usual or desirable limits
neighborhoods worming into lands reserved for wildlife
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
2
as in infiltrates
to introduce in a gradual, secret, or clever way
over a period of several years, the undercover agent was able to worm his way into the drug kingpin's confidence
Synonyms & Similar Words
Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of worms
MomTok got Taylor on the plane and off to star in The Bachelorette, but not before Dakota worms his way in one last time.
—
Joe Reid,
Vulture,
13 Mar. 2026
Guiteau eventually worms his way into an audience, ostensibly seeking an ambassadorship for his dubious contributions to the campaign but, in reality, requesting a path to greatness.
—
Inkoo Kang,
New Yorker,
11 Nov. 2025
Joe Reid,
Vulture,
13 Mar. 2026
Guiteau eventually worms his way into an audience, ostensibly seeking an ambassadorship for his dubious contributions to the campaign but, in reality, requesting a path to greatness.
—
Inkoo Kang,
New Yorker,
11 Nov. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for worms
Verb
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This revival finds new power in the intimate story of a family learning to love again set against one of the most consequential moments of the twentieth century, as the Nazi regime rises to power and authoritarianism encroaches on daily life.
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Paglen’s ideas, collected between two covers, carve a clean, linear path through our messy neural era, engaging in the kind of big-picture sense-making that books remain well suited to do, even as AI encroaches on this terrain.
Verb
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Without it, walls can have a knock-on effect that infiltrates the rest of your room.
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Nessa infiltrates Maryam’s life as her nurse, aiming to find the truth.
Verb
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When a Knicks game lets out at the Garden or concertgoers from the Meadowlands pour out of Penn Station, crowds pack the Tick Tock’s orange-and-green banquettes and the line snakes out the door.
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The River Caqueta snakes nearly 1,800 miles into the heart of the Amazon rainforest.
Verb
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One of them invites Bonnie over for a sleepover, and Jessie sneaks into her overnight bag, not realizing that toys are verboten to the new generation.
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Fans are less tame, however, when Mamdani sneaks into the bar through a side entrance with New York City’s First Lady, Rama Duwaji.
Verb
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Seltz’s system crawls hundreds of millions of pages a day, and returns results in under 200 milliseconds.
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At sunset, the city starts glowing around you while traffic crawls silently below.
Verb
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Once seated at the computer, the hacker inserts a USB drive or external hard drive.
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Encord replicated a real data center server rack, where an operator inserts blue cables into penny-sized sockets all day.
Verb
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Misalignment creeps in simply because a high volume of choices are handed off to local leaders operating under distinct market pressures.
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As our conversation extends into the hour mark, her hood creeps upward along the side of her face most visible to those around us.
Verb
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If that slips, though, Abrams would be a massive trade chip.
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People leave, culture erodes, the playbook changes faster than management can rewrite it, and so the edge slips to newcomers.
Cite this Entry
“Worms.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/worms. Accessed 28 Jun. 2026.
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