distracts

verb

present tense third-person singular of distract
1
as in diverts
to draw the attention or mind to something else we were distracted from our discussion by the noise outside

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in disturbs
to trouble the mind of; to make uneasy distracted by the looming tax deadline

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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 distracts Yes, a legal circus distracts from the things that matter and creates a massive amount of drama all its own. — Jackson McHenry, Vulture, 1 Oct. 2026 Often, undercapitalization is a major challenge for new franchisees and distracts from operations. — Angelo Chavez, Forbes.com, 4 Sep. 2026 Scientists now are spending an increasing amount of time worrying about keeping the lights on and people employed, which ultimately distracts from time spent doing research. — Abdullah Shihipar, STAT, 1 Sep. 2026 All the while, a clean-up crew led by Drew Starkey’s kinky, idiosyncratic hit man Cyrus follows close behind, but this is a third, more vestigial movie, which only distracts from the main event. — Siddhant Adlakha, Variety, 31 Aug. 2026 The antagonist of the new Toy Story film is a tablet, whose addictive presence distracts the toys’ young owner from unstructured, creative play. — Literary Hub, 28 Aug. 2026 Outer Banks’ success has always rested on an emotional depth that distracts from nonsense plot points and over-the-top escapades. — Ct Jones, Rolling Stone, 21 Aug. 2026 Mother’s explosion distracts Blaine and frees Sam. — Dessi Gomez, Deadline, 22 May 2026 In my view, platforming these young men and sensationalizing their behaviors, rather than recognizing those behaviors as signs of psychological distress, distracts from the urgent need to address these serious mental health concerns. — Jordyn Tovey, The Conversation, 22 May 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for distracts
  1. diverts
  2. disturbs
  3. detracts
  4. bothers
  5. worries
  6. angers
  7. unsettles
  8. concerns
Verb
  • Prop 137 diverts money from the state's current sales tax on sporting goods to conservation, wildfire risk mitigation and outdoor recreation programs.
    — Shaun Boyd, CBS News, 12 Oct. 2026
  • Providing false or misleading information to law enforcement undermines those efforts and unnecessarily diverts officers and resources away from members of our community who may need immediate police assistance.
    — Brie Stimson, FOXNews.com, 19 Sep. 2026
Definition of diverts
Verb
  • Some of the sightings claim a man wearing clothing typical of the 17th or 18th centuries, a man dressed in Confederate attire in the liquor room, a ghost of a former worker Joseph Hardesty and a female who actively disturbs visitors to her home.
    — Kaitlyn Keegan, Hartford Courant, 25 Sep. 2026
  • Vibration disturbs the natural sediments in wine, flattening the flavor and aging it prematurely.
    — Brandee Gruener, Southern Living, 25 Sep. 2026
Definition of disturbs
Verb
  • If the expansion detracts somehow from the SARA cult fever, the co-owners are OK with that.
    — Senior Wine Critic, San Francisco Chronicle, 15 June 2017
Definition of detracts
Verb
  • Resist that reflex long enough to understand what bothers you.
    — Tarot.com, New York Daily News, 9 Oct. 2026
  • Fix what genuinely bothers you, but do not turn your whole life into a renovation project.
    — Tarot.com, Chicago Tribune, 8 Oct. 2026
Definition of bothers
Verb
  • Making wellness accessible As holistic wellness becomes increasingly mainstream, Warren-Thomas worries that rising costs are making some services inaccessible to the communities they were originally intended to serve.
    — Kansas City Star, Kansas City Star, 15 Oct. 2026
  • China worries The initial jitters came at the start of the week after China's leading memory chipmaker ChangXin Memory Technologies, or CXMT, announced plans to roll out a server memory product based on new architecture.
    — Arjun Kharpal, CNBC, 15 Oct. 2026
Definition of worries
Verb
  • Lai and his Democratic Progressive Party champion Taiwan’s separate identity from China, a position that frequently angers Beijing, which views the island as Chinese territory.
    — Reuters, NBC news, 5 Oct. 2026
  • The receptionist angers Kripke and Bert so much that they are picked up by the police — along with Stuart, who had also been arrested.
    — Michael Schneider, Variety, 31 July 2026
Definition of angers
Verb
  • Spry said the attacker could have targeted any neighborhood residents — a thought that still unsettles her, given how easily the situation could have escalated.
    — Doha Madani, NBC news, 5 Aug. 2026
  • That is precisely the capability that unsettles underwriters, because an agent that can decide is an agent that can decide wrongly, and fast.
    — Dara-Abasi Ita, Forbes.com, 12 June 2026
Definition of unsettles
Verb
  • The dispute also concerns how OpenAI recruited former Apple employees for its consumer hardware and robotics teams.
    — Aamir Khollam, Interesting Engineering, 14 Oct. 2026
  • But there is another kind of encampment that concerns me even more.
    — Rabbi Bruce D. Forman, Sun Sentinel, 13 Oct. 2026
Definition of concerns

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distractive
distracts
distrait
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Cite this Entry

“Distracts.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/distracts. Accessed 19 Oct. 2026.

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