DESOLATING Synonyms: 161 Similar and Opposite Words

desolating

verb

present participle of desolate

as in destroying

to bring to a complete end the physical soundness, existence, or usefulness of totally desolated the city with aerial bombs

Synonyms & Similar Words

Relevance

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for desolating

Verb

Sonil Jain, Co-founder of Sowtex and ReMaterial, noted that for a fabric exporter trading with Russia, Brazil, or the UAE, there were many possible benefits, including cheaper, faster B2B settlements without dollar-clearing fees destroying margins.

— Mayu Saini, Footwear News, 14 Sep. 2026
Some put the chance of AI destroying everyone, everywhere, all at once at around 50%.

— Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 11 Sep. 2026

Definition of destroying

Verb

Military force has imposed enormous costs on both Hamas and Iran, devastating their military facilities and killing their commanders.

— NADIA SCHADLOW, Foreign Affairs, 18 Sep. 2026
The country is also recovering from devastating back-to-back earthquakes in June that have so far killed over 6,000 people.

— Syra Ortiz Blanes, Miami Herald, 5 Sep. 2026

Definition of devastating

Verb

Last week a number of concerned mathematicians, many of them at the top of their subject, launched the Association for Human Mathematics (AHM)—an effort that was underway even before the earth-shattering Navier-Stokes news.

— Joseph Howlett, Scientific American, 14 Sep. 2026
Maya’s fear of commitment mirrors the film’s fear of showing us anything truly ugly or grappling with the idea that our heroine is one of many, many people who lost someone during a society-shattering number of years.

— Jourdain Searles, HollywoodReporter, 14 Sep. 2026

Definition of shattering

Verb

And Hollywood really should stop ruining good shows trying to chase that approval.

— Dan Zaksheske OutKick, FOXNews.com, 18 Sep. 2026
The near-miss is one of the more potent and consequential instances of a hallucinating AI ruining the reliability of a professional report.

— Kyle Orland, ArsTechnica, 18 Sep. 2026

Definition of ruining

Verb

One drone operator talks about going out for lunch or hanging out with their friends in Tel Aviv after demolishing people’s houses in Gaza from miles away.

— Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 10 Sep. 2026
At Cordova Villa Elementary, construction includes demolishing the existing administration building and a classroom building.

— Camryn Dadey, Sacbee.com, 4 Sep. 2026

Definition of demolishing

Verb

Here’s how the shift happened, what the ingredient actually does below the neck and how to fold it into a routine without wrecking your skin barrier.

— Hanna Wickes, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 15 Sep. 2026
The general public learned of the demolition plan only when the wrecking equipment began work nearly three months later.

— Dan Diamond, Washington Post, 9 Sep. 2026

Definition of wrecking

Verb

You can often get prequalified to get a sense of the rate and term a lender is likely to approve you for, without damaging your credit score.

— Dan Avery,Brett Holzhauer, CNBC, 17 Sep. 2026
Zelensky said that a passenger train was also struck in the Mykolaiv region on Wednesday, damaging a railway station and a diesel locomotive.

— Hanna Arhirova, Los Angeles Times, 16 Sep. 2026

Definition of damaging

Verb

The helicopter crashed in a driveway between two warehouses, smashing into a pair of truck cargo containers while the news crew tried grabbing video footage of a serious collision involving a Metro bus that also left two people dead.

— Carlos De Loera, Los Angeles Times, 18 Sep. 2026
In the rare instances people have spotted, these birds avoid getting stung by smashing the wasps on the ground to break the stingers before finishing their meal.

— Sean Donnelly, USA Today, 17 Sep. 2026

Definition of smashing

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.

Browse Nearby Words

desolates

desolating

desolation

See all Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

Style

“Desolating.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/desolating. Accessed 22 Sep. 2026.

Copy Citation

Synonyms of desolating

verb

Example Sentences

Browse Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

More from Merriam-Webster

Word of the Day

nemesis

Popular in Grammar & Usage

Why do we use apostrophes to show possession?

Merriam-Webster’s Great Big List of Words You Love to Hate

The Exceptions of '-s' and '-es' Plurals

A Who’s Who Regarding ‘Who’s’ and ‘Whose’

'A' or 'an'? What about before 'h'? An Indefinite Article Guide

Popular in Wordplay

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't

Back to School Vocabulary

Words from the 'Odyssey'

14 Phobias You Probably Haven't Heard Of

Why do we say 'fly off the handle'?

Popular

Why do we use apostrophes to show possession?

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't

Back to School Vocabulary

Games & Quizzes