1
as in to flutter
to move or cause to move with a striking motion
started to flail his arms wildly when he spied a bat in the house
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2
as in to whip
to strike repeatedly with something long and thin or flexible
gruesome evidence that the prisoner had been flailed
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of flail
Chris Brennan, USA Today, 18 Sep. 2025
Weeks 3 and 4, when Denver was flailing.
—Troy Renck, Denver Post, 18 Sep. 2025
But as the public struggled to make sense of the event, media organizations were flailing too.
—Taylor Lorenz, HollywoodReporter, 17 Sep. 2025
Thanks to that Hail Mary pass of a merger proposal Alex brought in to block her billionaire then-boyfriend and handsome skeezeball Paul Marks from scooping up the flailing network, the merged networks of UBA and NBN are now known as UBN.
—Maggie Fremont, Vulture, 17 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for flail
Noun
And, back at home, his FBI director, Kash Patel was flailing in a pair of congressional hearings this week when asked about Epstein.
—Chris Brennan, USA Today, 18 Sep. 2025
Weeks 3 and 4, when Denver was flailing.
—Troy Renck, Denver Post, 18 Sep. 2025
But as the public struggled to make sense of the event, media organizations were flailing too.
—Taylor Lorenz, HollywoodReporter, 17 Sep. 2025
Thanks to that Hail Mary pass of a merger proposal Alex brought in to block her billionaire then-boyfriend and handsome skeezeball Paul Marks from scooping up the flailing network, the merged networks of UBA and NBN are now known as UBN.
—Maggie Fremont, Vulture, 17 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for flail
Recent Examples of Synonyms for flail
Verb
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And perhaps strangest of all, an indoor flagpole that will flutter in a direction corresponding to the wind outside.—
Kim Velsey,
Curbed,
9 Oct. 2025
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Longer pieces reached the tops of her cheekbones, fluttering out like wings.—
Kaleigh Werner,
Footwear News,
6 Oct. 2025
Verb
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The question was whether new coach Marco Sturm was going to be able to whip this team into the hard-to-play-against, defensively sound unit they were designed to be.—
Steve Conroy,
Boston Herald,
12 Oct. 2025
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Harrison's head whipped back and slammed into the turf at Lucas Oil Stadium.—
Matt Audilet,
MSNBC Newsweek,
12 Oct. 2025
Noun
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For nearly 80 minutes, Jeezy bludgeons you with sermonic non sequiturs laid over pounding trap beats that quickly became as ubiquitous as imitations of his paper-chasing memoir fragments.—
Pitchfork,
Pitchfork,
30 Sep. 2025
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The transformation of the rattlesnake into a colonial icon coincided with the demise of the snakes themselves as settlers began to bludgeon rattlesnakes by the thousands.—
Matthew Wills,
JSTOR Daily,
3 Aug. 2025
Verb
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Moments later, the monarch began to flap its wings and crawl onto Bendicksen’s hand.—
Aamir Khollam,
Interesting Engineering,
11 Oct. 2025
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But its appeal can’t be divorced from the romance of its history, which properly began in the 19th century when English polo players began wearing oxford shirts as their preferred uniform, complete with collars that buttoned against the body to prevent their points from flapping in the wind.—
Eric Twardzik,
Robb Report,
6 Oct. 2025
Verb
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Of course, the bags don’t actually hide anything; in fact, they are reserved specifically for, and definitively signal, the drinking of alcohol.—
Joshua Rothman,
New Yorker,
14 Oct. 2025
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The measure, which has failed to make it through the Legislature twice before, would require insurance companies to cover additional screenings, like an MRI, for women diagnosed with breast tissue that can hide cancer from traditional mammograms.—
Molly Beck,
jsonline.com,
14 Oct. 2025
Noun
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The announcement was not explicitly framed as a cudgel against drugmakers that had failed to agree to Trump’s previous pricing demands, but a three-year exemption from the tariffs was apparently enough to get Pfizer on board.—
Nicholas Florko,
The Atlantic,
2 Oct. 2025
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When words lose their original meanings and are repurposed as verbal cudgels, the public sphere becomes a jungle of denunciation, intimidation, and even violence.—
Ian Buruma,
New Yorker,
22 Sep. 2025
Verb
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Milei has slashed government spending, cut regulations and fired tens of thousands of public-sector workers since taking office in 2023.—
Bryan Mena,
CNN Money,
12 Oct. 2025
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But the power play struck gold in the second period, starting with Zach Bogosian drawing a slashing minor.—
Michael Russo,
New York Times,
12 Oct. 2025
Noun
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Video from the protest showed the elderly and people with disabilities among those arrested, including a blind man using a mobility cane and two people in wheelchairs.—
Kara Fox,
CNN Money,
5 Oct. 2025
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Sugar comes from sugar cane or sugar beets.—
Merve Ceylan,
Health,
2 Oct. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Flail.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/flail. Accessed 16 Oct. 2025.
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