1
as in decomposing
to go through decomposition
a dead mouse corrupting in the walls produced a terrible smell
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in degrading
to lower in character, dignity, or quality
some observers believe that grossly violent movies corrupt the people who watch them as well as the people who make them
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
3
as in bribing
to influence someone with a bribe
he bragged about having corrupted half of the officials on the city council
Synonyms & Similar Words
Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of corrupting
But now, federal prosecutors say Hennen is the fixer behind the biggest point-shaving scandal in history, accused of bribing 39 college players, corrupting 17 programs and fixing — or trying fix — 29 games to enrich himself and other gamblers.
—
Andy Sheehan, CBS News, 26 Jan. 2026
Blakeney then recruited other players on the team, corrupting the integrity of games, according to the indictment.
—Paulina Dedaj , Ryan Morik , Andrew Fone, FOXNews.com, 15 Jan. 2026
Political opponents appear as corrupting forces, stripped of individual texture.
—Philip Martin, Washington Post, 7 Jan. 2026
Achim Kempf, the Chair for Physics of Information and AI in the Department of Applied Mathematics, and Koji Yamaguchi, then a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Waterloo, co-discovered a method to copy quantum information without corrupting it.
—Ameya Paleja, Interesting Engineering, 7 Jan. 2026
And Maduro, both, Juan Orlando Hernandez, were accused of prolific drug trafficking, enriching themselves, corrupting their country, and allowing violence and danger to flourish.
—ABC News, 4 Jan. 2026
First, someone, like the objecting citizen in Denton, warns that a dangerous force is corrupting the schools.
—Jonathan Zimmerman, The Atlantic, 23 Dec. 2025
Elites stirred up a now familiar moral panic about commerce corrupting letters and mocked Grub Street even as its writers built the first modern freelance economy and mass-print culture.
—Deni Ellis Béchard, Scientific American, 8 Nov. 2025
Tales From Beyond the Pale co-creator Glenn McQuaid unleashes a Jason Voorhees whose appearance is concealed not by a hockey mask but a squiggly blur of video noise, corrupting the handheld footage of him stalking college kids through the woods.
—A.a. Dowd, Vulture, 3 Oct. 2025
Andy Sheehan, CBS News, 26 Jan. 2026
Blakeney then recruited other players on the team, corrupting the integrity of games, according to the indictment.
—Paulina Dedaj , Ryan Morik , Andrew Fone, FOXNews.com, 15 Jan. 2026
Political opponents appear as corrupting forces, stripped of individual texture.
—Philip Martin, Washington Post, 7 Jan. 2026
Achim Kempf, the Chair for Physics of Information and AI in the Department of Applied Mathematics, and Koji Yamaguchi, then a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Waterloo, co-discovered a method to copy quantum information without corrupting it.
—Ameya Paleja, Interesting Engineering, 7 Jan. 2026
And Maduro, both, Juan Orlando Hernandez, were accused of prolific drug trafficking, enriching themselves, corrupting their country, and allowing violence and danger to flourish.
—ABC News, 4 Jan. 2026
First, someone, like the objecting citizen in Denton, warns that a dangerous force is corrupting the schools.
—Jonathan Zimmerman, The Atlantic, 23 Dec. 2025
Elites stirred up a now familiar moral panic about commerce corrupting letters and mocked Grub Street even as its writers built the first modern freelance economy and mass-print culture.
—Deni Ellis Béchard, Scientific American, 8 Nov. 2025
Tales From Beyond the Pale co-creator Glenn McQuaid unleashes a Jason Voorhees whose appearance is concealed not by a hockey mask but a squiggly blur of video noise, corrupting the handheld footage of him stalking college kids through the woods.
—A.a. Dowd, Vulture, 3 Oct. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for corrupting
Verb
-
Funk assures that the softened, decomposing cardboard will allow plants to grow through.—
Patricia Shannon,
Southern Living,
9 Feb. 2026
-
Jon Hallford, a southern Colorado funeral home owner who stashed nearly 200 decomposing bodies and gave families fake ashes, was sentenced on state charges on Friday.—
Maria Braganini,
CBS News,
6 Feb. 2026
Verb
-
Military planners outlined potential operational concepts aimed at degrading the program, including strikes on key manufacturing and development sites.—
Efrat Lachter,
FOXNews.com,
10 Feb. 2026
-
Making buses free risks degrading performance.—
Josh Appel,
Washington Post,
5 Feb. 2026
Verb
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Even without bribing the bots to provide direct advertising, brands are already trying to find ways to get into the good books of AI search results.—
Los Angeles Times,
Los Angeles Times,
11 Feb. 2026
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Then, in February of last year, Coral Gables criminal defense attorney David Macey was indicted along with Pagan on charges of bribing Costanzo to obtain confidential information about drug-trafficking suspects to recruit them as potential clients for his law firm.—
Jay Weaver,
Miami Herald,
31 Jan. 2026
Verb
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This vacuum was meant to prevent the tungsten filament––that’s the little wire inside the bulb, the thing that glows––from burning up and disintegrating immediately, which is what a very hot piece of metal would do in the presence of oxygen.—
Natalia Sánchez Loayza,
Scientific American,
5 Feb. 2026
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As in a seventeenth-century poem by John Donne, George Herbert, or Andrew Marvell, the fraught human body is a microcosm, a mirror to the larger disintegrating world spirit.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
29 Jan. 2026
Verb
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And her co-stars—Jacob Elordi as a brooding Heathcliff, Alison Oliver as an angelic Isabella Linton, Hong Chau as a steely Nelly Dean, and Shazad Latif as a swaggering Edgar Linton—would also be subverting our expectations.—
Radhika Seth,
Vogue,
10 Jan. 2026
-
After collaborating with Sotheby’s on a 2024 installation of Impressionism, for which they were tasked with subverting assumptions of the movement, the duo are now conceiving the company’s new restaurant, Marcel, named after the architect.—
Sam Cochran,
Architectural Digest,
8 Jan. 2026
Verb
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This is so outrageous that even Creepy Professor Oliver McCreepenstein, a middle-aged married man currently seducing his 17-year-old student, is aghast.—
Kathleen Walsh,
Vulture,
10 Feb. 2026
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Always on the phone, Evans was soon seducing and scrapping with everyone from Frank Sinatra (who threatened to pull Mia Farrow off Rosemary’s Baby) to suits refusing to cast a washed up Marlon Brando in The Godfather.—
Hadley Hall Meares,
Vanity Fair,
9 Feb. 2026
Verb
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Sporotrichosis is a fungal infection of the skin caused by exposure to a fungus that lives in soil, plants, decaying vegetation, moss and hay.—
Leslie Baumann,
Miami Herald,
13 Feb. 2026
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When Qualls saw the building again on a cool day last month, the renovation was a night-and-day transformation from the decaying structure that had sat vacant for several decades, its roof near collapsing.—
Dallas Morning News,
Dallas Morning News,
11 Feb. 2026
Verb
-
Unbalanced Or Leaning Tree A weakening root system or poor pruning practices can cause a tree to lean to one side.—
Brandee Gruener,
Southern Living,
15 Feb. 2026
-
My opponent, Tim O’Hare, has led with ideology and performative politics, reducing transparency, weakening public participation, and creating financial instability through deficit-style budgeting and reserve spending.—
Rachel Royster,
Fort Worth Star-Telegram,
14 Feb. 2026
Cite this Entry
“Corrupting.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/corrupting. Accessed 18 Feb. 2026.
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