CLEANING (UP) Synonyms: 139 Similar and Opposite Words

cleaning (up)

verb

present participle of clean (up)

as in tidying (up)

to make a place neat and orderly by removing extraneous stuff you're expected to clean up after you use the workroom

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms

as in censoring

to remove objectionable parts from cleaned up the rock star's interview before publishing it in the newspaper

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms

as in eradicating

to destroy all traces of hurriedly cleaned up the mess that they had created in the kitchen

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Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for cleaning (up)

Verb

Henderson sent several texts to a partner at DTLA about picking up checks for his work in Val Verde, according to messages reviewed by The Times.

— Rebecca Ellis, Los Angeles Times, 12 July 2026
Later in the second half, Olise teed up Ousmane Dembele with prodded outside-of-the-boot passes after picking up loose balls in front of the defence.

— Thom Harris, New York Times, 4 July 2026

Definition of picking up

Verb

Aguirre’s interviews are carefully edited with bleeps, censoring the ‘cabr—s’, the ‘hijos de p—s’ and ‘carambas’.

— Colin Millar, New York Times, 4 July 2026
Vance asserted that the 2020 election was rigged due to tech companies censoring information.

— Britta Miller, The Washington Examiner, 27 June 2026

Definition of censoring

Verb

When William and his brother, Prince Harry, were young boys, the former Princess of Wales would regularly take them to homeless shelters, and eradicating homelessness has become a cornerstone of the future king’s royal work.

— Rachel Burchfield, InStyle, 30 June 2026
The path through impostor syndrome is not about eradicating the doubt.

— Karyn Gallant, Forbes.com, 30 June 2026

Definition of eradicating

Verb

The successful transfer highlights the digital twin’s accuracy and shows how robotics software can be rapidly validated before operating on real hardware, significantly shortening development cycles.

— Jijo Malayil, Interesting Engineering, 9 July 2026
On Tuesday, a Paris appeals court cleared a path for the 57-year-old Le Pen to run by shortening a ban on seeking public office that had spelled possible doom for her ambitions.

— ABC News, ABC News, 8 July 2026

Definition of shortening

Verb

The birthright citizenship ruling was a win for democracy — and a warning about erasing history, argues columnist Anita Chabria.

— Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 2 July 2026
Love is the capacity to hold difference without fragmentation, to bring parts into relationship without erasing their uniqueness and to align intelligence with constructive becoming.

— Pravir Malik, Forbes.com, 1 July 2026

Definition of erasing

Verb

Shares slumped 16% for a third straight session of losses, wiping out $400 billion in market cap on Monday alone.

— Gail Krishnan, CNBC, 23 June 2026
The prospect of even a mini-Dust Bowl is alarming as the original disaster during the Great Depression sent dust clouds across rural America, wiping out entire communities and triggering mass migration to other parts of the country.

— Jason Ma, Fortune, 21 June 2026

Definition of wiping out

Verb

Many of its candidates support entirely eliminating immigration enforcement, abolishing the police, sweeping wealth redistribution and expanding government ownership over significant sectors of the economy.

— Bobby Zirkin, Baltimore Sun, 29 June 2026
But how does that -- how does abolishing prisons or having open borders fit into that?

— ABC News, ABC News, 28 June 2026

Definition of abolishing

Verb

For a few minutes at each end of that window, the moon’s edge will appear to align with that of the sun, blotting out the star’s fierce light and revealing the wispy corona off to one side.

— Meghan Bartels, Scientific American, 6 Apr. 2026
From up in the space shuttle, in 1983, astronaut Sally Ride could see the pollution blotting out her Los Angeles hometown.

— Patt Morrison, Los Angeles Times, 26 Mar. 2026

Definition of blotting out

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.

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Style

“Cleaning (up).” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/cleaning%20%28up%29. Accessed 14 Jul. 2026.

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Synonyms of cleaning (up)

verb

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