reject

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verb

re·ject ri-ˈjekt

rejected; rejecting; rejects

Synonyms of reject next

transitive verb

: to refuse to accept, consider, submit to, take for some purpose, or use

rejected the suggestion

reject a manuscript

: to refuse to hear, receive, or admit : rebuff, repel

parents who reject their children

: to refuse as lover or spouse

obsolete : to cast off

: throw back, repulse

: to spew out

: to subject to immunological rejection

rejecter noun

or rejector

ri-ˈjek-tər

rejectingly

ri-ˈjek-tiŋ-lē

adverb

rejective

ri-ˈjek-tiv

adjective

reject

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noun

re·ject ˈrē-ˌjekt

: a rejected person or thing

especially : one rejected as not wanted, unsatisfactory, or not fulfilling requirements

Choose the Right Synonym for reject

decline, refuse, reject, repudiate, spurn mean to turn away by not accepting, receiving, or considering.

decline often implies courteous refusal especially of offers or invitations.

declined his party's nomination

refuse suggests more positiveness or ungraciousness and often implies the denial of something asked for.

refused to lend them the money

reject implies a peremptory refusal by sending away or discarding.

rejected the manuscript as unpublishable

repudiate implies a casting off or disowning as untrue, unauthorized, or unworthy of acceptance.

teenagers who repudiate the values of their parents

spurn stresses contempt or disdain in rejection or repudiation.

spurned his overtures of friendship

Example Sentences

Verb My teacher rejected my excuse for being late. The committee rejected my proposal. The produce inspector rejected several crates of berries that had begun to grow mold. The college rejects hundreds of applicants each year. We rejected 5 of the 10 job applicants right away. Noun Stack the promising applications here, and put the rejects over there. was the school reject as a child and has low self-esteem even today See More

Recent Examples on the Web

Verb

Families can increase the likelihood of suicide attempts, too, by rejecting the standard advice about locking up medications and guns. —

Maggie Jones, New York Times, 17 May 2023 The rapper had also been candid about his affiliation with Brooklyn gangs, but rejected the negative connotations, such as violence and criminal activity. —

Jonah Valdez, Los Angeles Times, 17 May 2023 Justices without comment rejected the Alabama attorney general's request to review an 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision regarding inmate Kenneth Eugene Smith. —

CBS News, 16 May 2023 The House Committee on Energy and Commerce joined several state and federal regulators in scrutinizing the legality of Cigna rejecting the payment of certain claims using a system known as PXDX. —

Patrick Rucker, ProPublica, 16 May 2023 One day earlier she was narrowly rejected by the Legislature from serving on the University of Alaska’s Board of Regents. —

Sean Maguire, Anchorage Daily News, 16 May 2023 Last August, a Chinese court rejected an appeal by Zhou, the former state media intern, putting an end to her years-long landmark case and dealing a severe blow to the movement. —

Nectar Gan, CNN, 15 May 2023 Musk’s claim that the SEC exploited his consent decree to conduct bad-faith, harassing investigations that violated his First Amendment free speech rights under the Constitution was rejected by the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan. —

Charisma Madarang, Rolling Stone, 15 May 2023 Courtesy Basketball coaches reject MOV Yet another MIAA sport committee has weighed in on the margin-of-victory (MOV) component in the association’s power ranking formula that has been utilized since 2021-22 in the seeding process for the statewide tournaments. —

Ethan Fuller, BostonGlobe.com, 14 May 2023

Noun

Looking like a small-time bandit/perpetual masquerade-ball reject — and breathing like Darth Vader — as one attempts to go about one's daily routine has been a notable inconvenience, no matter how lifesaving the action might be and no matter how totally cute and hip many of these masks have been. —

Helaine Williams, Arkansas Online, 23 May 2021 Photos that weren’t used for promotion at the time were placed in a reject box and stashed away in a file cabinet. —

Patrick Sauer, Smithsonian Magazine, 31 Jan. 2023 The Inner Richmond dad in March 2021 founded Refuse Refuse — meaning reject trash — as a one-man cleanup operation determined to keep his block tidy. —

Heather Knight, San Francisco Chronicle, 19 Jan. 2023 While some political observers feared — and polls suggested — voters might storm the ballot box in a frothing, burn-it-all-down, reject-everything kind of mood, that’s not what happened. —

Heather Knight, San Francisco Chronicle, 12 Nov. 2022 Leaders of this kind, from all backgrounds, are undermined by the hyper-partisan politics of our day that require ideological rigidity and reject growth, inspiration, connection and courage. —

William Inboden, CNN, 8 Oct. 2022 In March, the FDA’s Peripheral and Central Nervous System Drugs Advisory Committee, a panel of independent medical experts, voted 6-4 to recommend the FDA reject Amylyx’s application. —

Ryan Cross, BostonGlobe.com, 29 Sep. 2022 As a general principle, the Baduy reject vaccinations, although some have reluctantly accepted them in order to travel outside the area. —

New York Times, 11 July 2022 Those who serve in Congress must be wary of, and reject, proposals that would further politicize the Court and add to the decline in the public’s trust in it. —

Anchorage Daily News, 7 Aug. 2022 See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'reject.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.