fleeing

verb

present participle of flee
1
as in disappearing
to cease to be visible the fog fled with the arrival of the dawn

Synonyms & Similar Words

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in escaping
to get free from a dangerous or confining situation a murderer who fled on foot

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms
3
as in retreating
to hasten away from something dangerous or frightening a toddler who fled when the ladybug he had been quietly watching suddenly began flying around the room

Synonyms & Similar Words

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 fleeing Drones struck the nearby town of Al-Burj Al-Shamali, which was subsequently hit by a strike from a fighter jet, NNA said on Thursday, adding that people were seen fleeing toward Tyre. — Todd Symons, CNN Money, 6 Aug. 2026 Then, one of the men can be seen pulling out a gun, shooting at the influencer and immediately fleeing the scene. — Jessica Schladebeck, New York Daily News, 5 Aug. 2026 At the time of the incident, the outlet reported that passengers and MTA workers could be seen fleeing the station. — Desiree Anello, PEOPLE, 4 Aug. 2026 He is accused of then fleeing the scene in a vehicle being driven by Lackard, according to police. — Meredith Deliso, ABC News, 4 Aug. 2026 Cellphone video obtained by CBS News New York showed both subway riders and MTA workers fleeing the station. — Andrew Ramos, CBS News, 4 Aug. 2026 The victim, who was uninjured, said an unknown male had shot at him before fleeing on foot. — Hema Sivanandam, Mercury News, 3 Aug. 2026 Rollison was seen fleeing from the scene on a bicycle, stopped and arrested, Gianino said. — Angie Dimichele, Sun Sentinel, 3 Aug. 2026 Another relative, Lolo Villalobos, was the longtime mayor of Guanabacoa, Cuba, before fleeing the country after Fidel Castro took power. — Austin Horn july 30, Miami Herald, 30 July 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for fleeing
  1. disappearing
  2. escaping
  3. retreating
  4. vanishing
  5. flying
  6. bolting
  7. fading
  8. running
Verb
  • The workflows are versioned, reused, and improved rather than disappearing after a single interaction, and Sunny regularly coordinates with other agents.
    — Will Drover, Fortune, 5 Aug. 2026
  • Africa is warming faster than the global average, and a UN climate report said that Mount Kenya’s glaciers are disappearing particularly fast, losing more than half their area in the last decade.
    — Tom Chivers, semafor.com, 5 Aug. 2026
Definition of disappearing
Verb
  • Seal air leaks and improve insulation to stop conditioned air from escaping your home.
    — Alora Bopray, USA Today, 30 July 2026
  • Another notable trend in technical textiles is the goal of escaping petrochemical dependency through green chemistry, bio-fabrication and circular textile systems.
    — Arthur Zaczkiewicz, Footwear News, 27 July 2026
Definition of escaping
Verb
  • Record-low water levels along the Danube River have exposed dozens of German military shipwrecks near the Serbian town of Prahovo, where an estimated 200 vessels were deliberately scuttled by retreating Nazi forces in 1944.
    — Kaif Shaikh, Interesting Engineering, 4 Aug. 2026
  • Surveillance video recovered by police showed the two men fighting in an alley and then Britt retreating from Fitzsimmons, according to the charging document.
    — Meredith Deliso, ABC News, 3 Aug. 2026
Definition of retreating
Verb
  • One week after Connecticut reserved $500 million from last year’s surplus to potentially replace vanishing federal dollars for human services, surging revenues already have replenished much of the state’s coffers.
    — Keith M. Phaneuf, Hartford Courant, 3 Aug. 2026
  • The idea was to memorialize a vanishing Eden and the end of his five years of vagabonding, working on rivers, paying no rent.
    — Nick Paumgarten, New Yorker, 3 Aug. 2026
Definition of vanishing
Verb
  • Flights at Germany's Leipzig/Halle Airport, a major cargo hub, were disrupted during the night after a sighting of a flying object was reported and another object was found near a runway, police said Wednesday.
    — ABC News, ABC News, 5 Aug. 2026
  • As a result, the squad were much further down the fitness road in the States, helped by playing two friendlies against Wisla Krakow and Manchester United before flying out.
    — Richard Sutcliffe, New York Times, 4 Aug. 2026
Definition of flying
Verb
  • His startup, Foundational Industries, just raised a $25 million seed round, Fortune learned exclusively, to build factories where AI runs the whole operation rather than bolting automation onto an old assembly line.
    — Lily Mae Lazarus, Fortune, 30 July 2026
  • To save the cost and effort of pumping millions of liters of seawater solely to obtain minerals, the researchers propose bolting modular reactors onto coastal desalination plants, which already move enormous quantities of the stuff.
    — New Atlas, New Atlas, 27 July 2026
Definition of bolting
Verb
  • The successor to the Tour de France Féminin, the Grande Boucle Féminine Internationale, operated for years in a state of underfunding before fading from the calendar entirely.
    — Lindsey Darvin, Forbes.com, 31 July 2026
  • Yet the company does have contend with fading interest from its existing consumer base; most users tend to use the product less after two weeks, except for momentary bumps from competitions.
    — Justin Birnbaum, Sportico.com, 30 July 2026
Definition of fading
Verb
  • Persistent heatwaves are not only driving up the cost of keeping society running and disrupting companies' production and operations, but are also putting pressure on European economic growth.
    — , CNBC, 4 Aug. 2026
  • There are also plenty of trainers – two-time Triple Crown winner Bob Baffert among them – who rarely balk at running Derby winners back two weeks later in the Preakness.
    — Dana O’Neil, CNN Money, 4 Aug. 2026
Definition of running

Browse Nearby Words

fleecy
fleeing
flees
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Cite this Entry

“Fleeing.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/fleeing. Accessed 7 Aug. 2026.

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More from Merriam-Webster on fleeing

Nglish: Translation of fleeing for Spanish Speakers

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