✨📕 The NEWThe NEW Collegiate Dictionary, 12th Edition Over 5,000 words added — Buy Now! Collegiate DictionaryBuy Now!

disconcerting 1 of 2

disconcerting

2 of 2

verb

present participle of disconcert

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 disconcerting
Adjective
Perhaps as disconcerting as anything is the lack of circumstances that would create such confusion. Alec Lewis, New York Times, 10 Nov. 2025 The disconcerting scene offers a glimpse of what actually happened to Will while he was trapped for most of Season 1 and suggests that Will may still be impacted by whatever Vecna put inside him at the beginning of the story. Emily Zemler, Rolling Stone, 7 Nov. 2025 Even his portrayal of a man with advanced dementia, in The Father (2020), which won the Academy Award for Best Actor, emitted a disconcerting power. Literary Hub, 6 Nov. 2025 The Garfield of the book is, so far anyway, the Garfield of the show, carrying a humility and nobility that’s frankly disconcerting coming from Michael Shannon, who’s usually cast as more wayward types. Scott Tobias, Vulture, 6 Nov. 2025 The Land of Spooks is a phantasmagorical blend of twisting gothic spires, impossible land formations, and disconcerting expressionist proportions. Kambole Campbell, IndieWire, 4 Nov. 2025 The findings are deeply disconcerting. Stephanie Silverman, Fortune, 28 Oct. 2025 There is nothing more disconcerting than seeing rolls of toilet paper bobbing down the hallway. Inga, San Diego Union-Tribune, 27 Oct. 2025 And things grow even more disconcerting when Miss Giddens begins seeing things and hearing voices. Steven Thrash, Entertainment Weekly, 25 Oct. 2025
Verb
The code, though, is currently often replete with disconcerting troubles. Lance Eliot, Forbes.com, 18 Sep. 2025 This detail, at once tragic and comic, painfully human and stupidly bureaucratic, captures something essential about Schattenfroh, an extremely dark novel about the horrors of modern European history laced with the delirious, disconcerting humor of a Hieronymus Bosch painting. Book Marks september 11, Literary Hub, 11 Sep. 2025 The young actor has a disconcerting awareness of the roiling potential of his changing body. Doreen St. Félix, The New Yorker, 22 Mar. 2025 Even without Karl-Anthony Towns, Minnesota’s size remains disconcerting to the Nuggets, especially when Aaron Gordon is out. Bennett Durando, The Denver Post, 13 Mar. 2025 And disconcerting moments are in the show, such as the larger-than-life black widow spiders that dangle from the ceiling. Dewayne Bevil, Orlando Sentinel, 19 Feb. 2025 The fact all these acquisition titles are leaving snail tracks in their quests for distributors to bring them to theaters or streaming services is disconcerting, for sure. Mike Fleming Jr, Deadline, 2 Feb. 2025 That text message turned out to be the first in a series of disconcerting messages friends and family members would apparently receive from Michael Shaver over the course of the next two and a half years. Paige Harriss, ABC News, 10 Jan. 2025 Russia was becoming more closed, and this was disconcerting for a generation that had grown up in a modernized and relatively open society. Andrei Kolesnikov, Foreign Affairs, 15 Oct. 2024
Recent Examples of Synonyms for disconcerting
Adjective
  • However, her mom has already managed to do one of the most embarrassing things imaginable.
    Jack Beresford, MSNBC Newsweek, 10 Nov. 2025
  • Alexander Hamilton—in the Hamilton musical portrayal, at least—is peak embarrassing boyfriend.
    Daniel Rodgers, Vogue, 10 Nov. 2025
Verb
  • Perplexity’s image features photographs of people with some truly nightmarish distortions on its wall, while the placement of its sink is confusing and distracting.
    PC Magazine, PC Magazine, 25 Oct. 2025
  • This was out of respect for me, and also to avoid confusing the children.
    Judith Martin, Mercury News, 23 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • My seat is hard and uncomfortable.
    Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 7 Nov. 2025
  • Whoever dispatched that ambulance might be one of many employees at the Department of Emergency Communications who have felt uncomfortable, yelled at and trapped between their calling to help people and what several current and former dispatchers have called a hostile work environment.
    Kirsten Fiscus, Nashville Tennessean, 6 Nov. 2025
Verb
  • Wolf’s voice, a bone-rattling growl, is his greatest legacy.
    Daniel de Visé, USA Today, 10 Nov. 2025
  • Lauren Petracca | Bloomberg | Getty Images A wave of layoffs is rattling corporate America.
    Josephine Rozzelle, CNBC, 5 Nov. 2025
Adjective
  • The rise of digital payment systems has made tipping both easier and more awkward, especially when prompts appear at counters, kiosks and drive-thru windows.
    Peter Burke, FOXNews.com, 9 Nov. 2025
  • Use this a couple of times a week for smoother, brighter skin (without getting sunburnt and sand in awkward places).
    Christa Joanna Lee, Allure, 9 Nov. 2025
Verb
  • The 34-year-old appeared to have deactivated her X account after disturbing posts on her account resurfaced online.
    Ryan Morik, FOXNews.com, 8 Nov. 2025
  • There was also disturbing evidence that violence had occurred there.
    Mason Leath, ABC News, 7 Nov. 2025
Adjective
  • Its natural deodorizing properties help neutralize the unpleasant smells associated with pets, according to Stein.
    Daley Quinn, Southern Living, 1 Nov. 2025
  • The 75-year-old ginkgo trees have been wafting the unpleasant smell into the air at the Northern California park, forcing residents to brave the stench that is comparable to vomit, The Sacramento Bee and SFGATE report.
    Natalia Senanayake, PEOPLE, 30 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • Jens generally chooses his words carefully, and is, what’s more, particularly reticent just after finishing a long and difficult winter delivery trip; what’s a person supposed to do with words in a blizzard anyway, up on a stormy heath and all directions lost?
    Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 10 Nov. 2025
  • In his first start in the wake of Beau Pribula’s significant injury, Zollers walked into a difficult situation, and his stat line reflected it.
    Maddie Hartley, Kansas City Star, 9 Nov. 2025

Browse Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“Disconcerting.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/disconcerting. Accessed 30 Nov. 2025.

More from Merriam-Webster on disconcerting

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!