drudgery

Synonym Chooser

How does the noun drudgery contrast with its synonyms?

Some common synonyms of drudgery are grind, labor, toil, travail, and work. While all these words mean "activity involving effort or exertion," drudgery suggests dull and irksome labor.

an editorial job with a good deal of drudgery

When might grind be a better fit than drudgery?

The synonyms grind and drudgery are sometimes interchangeable, but grind implies labor exhausting to mind or body.

the grind of the assembly line

When is it sensible to use labor instead of drudgery?

While the synonyms labor and drudgery are close in meaning, labor applies to physical or intellectual work involving great and often strenuous exertion.

farmers demanding fair compensation for their labor

Where would toil be a reasonable alternative to drudgery?

Although the words toil and drudgery have much in common, toil implies prolonged and fatiguing labor.

his lot would be years of back-breaking toil

In what contexts can travail take the place of drudgery?

The words travail and drudgery can be used in similar contexts, but travail is bookish for labor involving pain or suffering.

years of travail were lost when the house burned

When would work be a good substitute for drudgery?

In some situations, the words work and drudgery are roughly equivalent. However, work may imply activity of body, of mind, of a machine, or of a natural force.

too tired to do any work

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 drudgery The bar where everyone knows his name is his refuge from the day-to-day drudgery of his job as an accountant. John Tamny, Forbes.com, 24 May 2025 Venture capitalists speak of a future in which AI agents will sort through the drudgery of daily busywork and free us up to live our best lives. Damon Beres, The Atlantic, 20 May 2025 And back then, among real art people, fundraising was considered drudgery. Rachel Corbett, Vulture, 10 Apr. 2025 With this one invention, millions of secretaries would soon be relieved of the drudgery of constant retyping, and the business office would have a boon in productivity almost as profound as the one the typewriter itself had ushered in long before. Pat Butler, Sportico.com, 16 May 2025 See All Example Sentences for drudgery
Recent Examples of Synonyms for drudgery
Noun
  • But its depiction of the site of the hotel as a liminal space of corruption and menace suggests that all tourist fantasies are based on the exploitation of others’ histories, lands, labors, and bodies.
    Erik Morse, Vogue, 26 June 2025
  • Despite a difficult development market and ongoing construction labor shortage, Boise developers are forging ahead to remake the city.
    Nick Rosenberger, Idaho Statesman, 26 June 2025
Noun
  • Separate efforts by the United Nations to distribute limited food have been plagued by armed gangs looting trucks and by crowds of desperate people offloading supplies from convoys.
    Wafaa Shurafa, Chicago Tribune, 28 June 2025
  • Kota, the zoo's youngest male orangutan, started showing signs of lethargy and continued to decline despite efforts of zoo veterinary and animal care staff to administer care, the zoo said in the release.
    Harley Walls, Arkansas Online, 28 June 2025
Noun
  • More than a decade of physical and mental toil has caught up with me.
    Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 26 June 2025
  • The pictures, which were taken in twenty-six countries, cover an exotic range of human endeavors, including the production of perfume in Réunion, the quelling of the Kuwaiti oil fires, and, most famously, the toils of gold miners in Serra Pelada, Brazil.
    Chris Wiley, New Yorker, 31 May 2025
Noun
  • Harris said the comments coming on the federal holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States were consistent with Trump’s most recent policies and practices working against people of color.
    Nicquel Terry Ellis, CNN Money, 24 June 2025
  • The structure opened to the public on June 19, known as Juneteenth, the holiday marking the end of slavery in the United States.
    Sarah Kuta, Smithsonian Magazine, 23 June 2025
Noun
  • Sure, a high-intensity sweat session can make your heart pump harder, your breath quicken, and may even cause a burning-like feeling in your lungs and chest.
    Cindy Kuzma, SELF, 23 June 2025
  • By the end of the night, the whole team was dripping in sweat and covered in blisters, their pantyhose ripped from their high kicks.
    Elise Taylor, Vogue, 20 June 2025
Noun
  • The corporate laborers of the industrial age were drudges, and might have needed the scaffolding of managerial hierarchies to make widgets in bulk.
    Gideon Lewis-Kraus, The New Yorker, 19 Feb. 2025
  • In other words, exactly the type of drudge work that corporates have outsourced for decades to offshore teams from the likes of Accenture, Cognizant and Infosys.
    Iain Martin, Forbes, 4 Feb. 2025
Noun
  • Viewers have shared their own experiences with chronic anxiety, fatigue, and illness, some expressing relief at finally hearing an explanation that connects the dots surrounding their symptoms and broader societal conditions.
    Melissa Fleur Afshar, MSNBC Newsweek, 23 June 2025
  • Regardless of your fitness level, stay alert for other cardiac warning signs, too: pain that radiates down your arm or jaw, unusual fatigue, and fainting or almost fainting.
    Cindy Kuzma, SELF, 23 June 2025
Noun
  • The same is true for the NCAA insisting that students don’t qualify as employees of the colleges, despite the full-time daily grind of most players; colleges thereby save the vast expense of entering into an actual commercial relationship with their work force.
    Guy Lawson, Rolling Stone, 22 June 2025
  • But, in Dick’s opinion, Charlie grew tired of baseball’s daily grind.
    Patrick Saunders, Denver Post, 22 June 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Drudgery.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/drudgery. Accessed 3 Jul. 2025.

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