as in ascetic
given to or marked by restraint in the satisfaction of one's appetites
being abstemious diners, they avoid restaurants with all-you-can-eat buffets
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Recent Examples of abstemious
For the more abstemious, a bottle of Non3 ($30), a zero-proof sipping drink with notes of cinnamon and yuzu and a slightly tannic finish, alongside a Massimo Lunardon weird-little-dude goblet ($155)—not its official name, but certainly an accurate description of its weird-little-dudeness.
—
Helen Rosner, The New Yorker, 19 Nov. 2023
Low mass has always been a Miata virtue, endowing the car with not just precise handling but also an abstemious appetite for tires and fuel.
—Jonathan M. Gitlin, Ars Technica, 21 July 2023
While that might sound painfully abstemious or downright torturous, We Care has a few key things going for it.
—Liz Krieger, Town & Country, 1 Mar. 2023
But somehow, during his more recent years in Gujarat, Modi had managed to rebrand himself as a sunny, pro-business techno-utopian, an abstemious leader with an intuitive grasp of 21st-century infrastructure and social media.
—Mohammad Ali, WIRED, 14 Apr. 2020
See All Example Sentences for abstemious
Helen Rosner, The New Yorker, 19 Nov. 2023
Low mass has always been a Miata virtue, endowing the car with not just precise handling but also an abstemious appetite for tires and fuel.
—Jonathan M. Gitlin, Ars Technica, 21 July 2023
While that might sound painfully abstemious or downright torturous, We Care has a few key things going for it.
—Liz Krieger, Town & Country, 1 Mar. 2023
But somehow, during his more recent years in Gujarat, Modi had managed to rebrand himself as a sunny, pro-business techno-utopian, an abstemious leader with an intuitive grasp of 21st-century infrastructure and social media.
—Mohammad Ali, WIRED, 14 Apr. 2020
See All Example Sentences for abstemious
Recent Examples of Synonyms for abstemious
Adjective
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In fact, the ascetic value of fasting from meat required that the person otherwise enjoy it.—
Livia Gershon,
JSTOR Daily,
4 Aug. 2025
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Greens embodied the ascetic lushness of the farm-to-table movement, which, in Northern California, was synonymous with the Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse.—
John Birdsall,
New Yorker,
25 July 2025
Adjective
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As a purist, Murray defines sobriety as being completely abstinent from habit-forming substances that could cause dependency, including prescription drugs like Xanax and Suboxone.—
Frederick Melo,
Twin Cities,
23 Sep. 2025
Adjective
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Lower carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere then cooled the Earth, turning a hothouse planet into one with a more temperate climate, like the one enjoyed by life today.—
Chris Impey,
The Conversation,
23 Sep. 2025
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In an era of increasingly extreme weather, the disease is thriving in areas once considered cool and temperate.—
Nicole Fallert,
USA Today,
23 Sep. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Abstemious.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/abstemious. Accessed 29 Sep. 2025.
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