abrading 1 of 2

adjective

as in roughening

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abrading

2 of 2

verb

present participle of abrade
1
as in eroding
to damage or diminish by continued friction ropes abraded by the rocks were a huge danger to the climbers

Synonyms & Similar Words
2
as in irritating
to make sore by continued rubbing my new running shoes abraded my heels until they blistered

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3
as in scraping
to damage by rubbing against a sharp or rough surface the yacht's once-flawless wooden hull had been badly abraded by years of rough dockings

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Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of abrading
Verb
Prior to snapping its selfie, the rover had just finished abrading the rocky Arethusa outcrop. — Andrew Paul, Popular Science, 13 May 2026 Pockmarks and brittle edges show the abrading action of millennia of wind and rain. — Alex Ross, New Yorker, 24 Nov. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for abrading
  1. irritating
  2. eroding
  3. scratching
  4. scraping
  5. wearing
  6. fraying
  7. rubbing
Adjective
  • The larger battery gives it the sort of range that makes an EV genuinely useful for long-distance driving, while the interior avoids some of the irritating touchscreen-heavy trends found elsewhere.
    — Matthew MacConnell, Forbes.com, 18 Aug. 2026
  • Sabalenka double-faulted on match point, her seventh double fault of the day, to put an exclamation point on an irritating evening.
    — Lukas Weese, New York Times, 9 Aug. 2026
Definition of irritating
Verb
  • The program was part of a mid-century campaign that sought assimilation while eroding tribal sovereignty.
    — Rachel Monroe, New Yorker, 17 Aug. 2026
  • Structured gifts tend to build responsibility instead of eroding it.
    — Jonathan I. Shenkman, Forbes.com, 17 Aug. 2026
Definition of eroding
Verb
  • But all of these methods could damage the register by scratching the finish or denting the louvers.
    — Brandee Gruener, Southern Living, 16 Aug. 2026
  • Most on this roster aren’t established major leaguers, but players scratching and clawing for staying power.
    — Justice delos Santos, Mercury News, 15 Aug. 2026
Definition of scratching
Verb
  • With the sprightly energy of a schoolboy, Jean-Paul Doron bounds into an empty creek, his red suede shoes scraping pale rocks.
    — Dominique Soguel, Christian Science Monitor, 14 Aug. 2026
  • Any page that’s readable by a human could also be correctly interpreted by an AI scraping tool that simply renders the full webpage and uses optical character recognition on an image of the output.
    — Kyle Orland, ArsTechnica, 12 Aug. 2026
Definition of scraping
Verb
  • Police described the intruder as a 6-foot-tall skinny Black man between 30 and 40 years old, wearing a black hooded sweatshirt.
    — Logan Hall, CBS News, 17 Aug. 2026
  • Crystal Kung-Minkoff is the first to show up, wearing the titular trousers.
    — Louis Peitzman, Vulture, 17 Aug. 2026
Definition of wearing
Verb
  • More drones and missiles are slipping through both sides’ fraying air defenses, meaning that the civilian death toll has increased, and more critical infrastructure is being damaged.
    — Issy Ronald, CNN Money, 10 Aug. 2026
  • The accusations only make Winifred, who has secretly been dealing with a rapidly fraying psyche, more paranoid, leading to bloody and dangerous consequences.
    — Wilson Chapman, IndieWire, 30 July 2026
Definition of fraying
Verb
  • For instance, Qidi had to include a piece of Velcro to prevent the Polar Cooler tube from rubbing against the glass surface inside the top cover.
    — Michael Lydick, PC Magazine, 15 Aug. 2026
  • Republicans are rubbing their hands in glee at the neocommunist advance in their opposing party.
    — Steve Forbes, Forbes.com, 7 Aug. 2026
Definition of rubbing

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abrades
abrading
abrasion
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Cite this Entry

“Abrading.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/abrading. Accessed 22 Aug. 2026.

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More from Merriam-Webster on abrading

Nglish: Translation of abrading for Spanish Speakers

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