APPREHENDS Synonyms: 99 Similar and Opposite Words

apprehends

verb

present tense third-person singular of apprehend

as in knows

to have a clear idea of do you apprehend the importance of this discovery?

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms

as in arrests

to take or keep under one's control by authority of law the agency charged with apprehending criminals who have violated federal law

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms

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 apprehends John Early, as anyone encountering his work soon apprehends, chooses the latter. — Lauren Michele Jackson, New Yorker, 7 June 2026 Though the team immediately apprehends a suspect, the Marshals end up taking criticism from both sides. — Saman Shafiq, USA Today, 21 Mar. 2026 Neighbors are now living in fear, looking on as ICE apprehends people of color across Minnesota. — Jason Rantala, CBS News, 19 Jan. 2026 The team successfully seizes two tons of gold and apprehends the leader of the criminal network. — Isabella Wandermurem, Time, 14 Jan. 2026 Suppose the number is read in one case out of a hundred, and that the information reaches someone who apprehends the culprit in one case out of one thousand. — Thomas Brewster, Forbes.com, 3 Sep. 2025

Recent Examples of Synonyms for apprehends

Verb

Hard to follow the money No one knows the exact scale of cartel donations to Mexican political campaigns, but even former electoral officials acknowledge the sums are significant.

— Mary Beth Sheridan, CNN Money, 25 July 2026
The two of them party hard enough and often enough that local police officer Montgomery (Missi Pyle) knows them by name; when some particularly irresponsible carousing crosses a line, however, they’re slapped with a community service sentence.

— Guy Lodge, Variety, 25 July 2026

Definition of knows

Verb

Keith arrests our thinking, and cons us into suppressing our critical faculties with the same kind of internalized surveillance that philosopher Michel Foucault broke down to describe a prison’s use of the panopticon in Discipline and Punish.

— Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 19 May 2026
Devlin throws a punch at Stone when the chief arrests him for drunken driving.

— Sandra Dallas, Denver Post, 19 Apr. 2026

Definition of arrests

Verb

Despite not being a coffee drinker herself, Loyd understands the power of third place, creating connection, community, and a safe place for all to gather.

— Allison Smith, Forbes.com, 25 July 2026
Variety understands Odom bowed out after the first act and was replaced by Manaia Glassey-Ohlson.

— K.J. Yossman, Variety, 24 July 2026

Definition of understands

Verb

Rhaenyra, queen of the Blacks, seizes the Iron Throne in King’s Landing with the support of Alicent, who has simply had enough of her unstable and terrible sons.

— Jackson McHenry, Vulture, 13 July 2026
Trump seizes America’s 250th-birthday spotlight, headlining the Great American State Fair, hosting a UFC bout at the White House and promoting new passports, $250 bills and coins bearing his image.

— Will Weissert, Los Angeles Times, 3 June 2026

Definition of seizes

Verb

The policy guidance applies to agents under Enforcement and Removal Operations, the branch of ICE that detains and ultimately deports undocumented immigrants.

— Philip Wang, Time, 14 July 2026
Alligator Alcatraz houses a few hundred employees in trailers and detains about 650 male immigrants in large tents; until a few weeks ago, the number of those being detained was nearly 1,500.

— Eric Schlosser, The Atlantic, 4 June 2026

Definition of detains

Verb

In an oppositional reading of a media text, the audience comprehends that the message conflicts with or contradicts their personal experiences of society.

— Encyclopedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Britannica, 5 May 2026
In the end, A Guardian and a Thief is a story that comprehends hunger more deeply than the world that produces it.

— Tope Folarin, The Atlantic, 8 Nov. 2025

Definition of comprehends

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apprehending

apprehends

apprehensible

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“Apprehends.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/apprehends. Accessed 31 Jul. 2026.

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Synonyms of apprehends

verb

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