pulling

verb

present participle of pull
1
as in hauling
to cause to follow by applying steady force on a team of horses pulling a heavy wagon

Synonyms & Similar Words

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in prying
to draw out by force or with effort the dentist had to struggle to pull the tooth

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms
3
as in stretching
to injure by overuse, misuse, or pressure lift the crate carefully, or you'll pull a muscle

Synonyms & Similar Words

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 pulling One of the most fun parts of writing comedy is coming up with alt after alt after alt for a joke, pulling ever-increasingly stupid punch lines out of one’s ass. — Bethy Squires, Vulture, 23 Oct. 2026 The deputy made a U-turn and saw the man, who deputies say is 49-year-old Brenton Burke, kneeling under the truck’s steering column and pulling wires, the arrest report states. — David Goodhue, Miami Herald, 23 Oct. 2026 Williams got hurt in his second game of the season, pulling his hamstring in dramatic fashion. — David Troy Outkick, FOXNews.com, 22 Oct. 2026 DeWine stops short of pulling his endorsement But the governor stopped short of pulling his backing of the Republican for now. — Julie Carr Smyth, Los Angeles Times, 22 Oct. 2026 With a goal and two assists, Kucherov increased his total to 1,137 career points, pulling even with former teammate Steven Stamkos for the club record. — ABC News, 21 Oct. 2026 She was later also diagnosed with OCD and trichotillomania, a hair-pulling disorder associated with OCD and anxiety. — Nancy Jo Sales, HollywoodReporter, 21 Oct. 2026 Safe haven demand temporarily outweighed inflation fears, prompting capital to exit risk assets and flow into the Treasury market, thereby pulling yields lower. — CNBC, 16 Oct. 2026 With the United States pulling back, a new bargain in which Europe carries more of the nuclear burden and has more say in the choice to use these weapons is the only way to ensure transatlantic security. — Ivo H. Daalder, Foreign Affairs, 16 Oct. 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for pulling
  1. hauling
  2. prying
  3. stretching
  4. dragging
  5. yanking
  6. straining
  7. tugging
  8. extracting
Verb
  • To protect the boardwalk and the homes there, the city has been hauling sand from the west end of the beach to the east to create a buffer between the ocean and the shore.
    — Fedor Zarkhin, Los Angeles Times, 21 Oct. 2026
  • For now, Starship's most immediate role is hauling Starlink satellites in orbit.
    — Andrew Jones, Space.com, 14 Oct. 2026
Definition of hauling
Verb
  • Or prying mussels off rocks along South Africa’s Cape Peninsula.
    — Rachel Levin, Condé Nast Traveler, 28 Oct. 2026
  • Musk already has this via Larry, a close business associate who bankrolled the Twitter buy, but writing an eleven-figure check has a funny way of prying open the canal further.
    — Steven Zeitchik, HollywoodReporter, 22 Oct. 2026
Definition of prying
Verb
  • Like several other important fossils previously sold at auction, Jodi comes from Hell Creek Formation, a geological boneyard stretching across Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas.
    — Jacopo Prisco, CNN Money, 27 Oct. 2026
  • He was noticed stretching on the sideline and trying to keep his back loose with trainers, but to no avail.
    — Scott Thompson OutKick, FOXNews.com, 27 Oct. 2026
Definition of stretching
Verb
  • Most damage to the undersea cables that form the Internet’s backbone is the result of accidents involving bottom-trawling fishing nets and ship anchors dragging on the seabed, with storms and undersea landslides also factoring in.
    — Jeremy Hsu, ArsTechnica, 28 Oct. 2026
  • There’s nothing neutral about dragging your feet, and a rigorous investigation of crimes is the only job of the Justice Department.
    — Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 26 Oct. 2026
Definition of dragging
Verb
  • Shortly after, the video shows the same officer yanking him to the ground, punching and kicking him.
    — Ruben Vives, Los Angeles Times, 14 Oct. 2026
  • Zabransky was the first person to reach Rabb in the end zone, yanking him into the air for a bear hug.
    — Shaun Goodwin, Idaho Statesman, 3 Oct. 2026
Definition of yanking
Verb
  • The resulting wars in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran, along with settler violence in the occupied West Bank, have stoked worldwide outrage, straining ties with Israel's closest allies and fueling a rise in antisemitism.
    — Arkansas Online, Arkansas Online, 28 Oct. 2026
  • The resulting wars in Gaza, Lebanon and Iran, along with settler violence in the occupied West Bank, have stoked worldwide outrage, straining ties with Israel’s closest allies and fueling a rise in antisemitism.
    — Tia Goldenberg, Los Angeles Times, 27 Oct. 2026
Definition of straining
Verb
  • Sitting in a boat, tugging their house behind them, the journey initially appears to be going smoothly.
    — Aramide Tinubu, Variety, 8 Oct. 2026
  • The sweet gallery opens with Rocki tugging at a large wig placed on her head as Rihanna can be heard laughing in the background.
    — Mitchell Peters, Billboard, 27 Sep. 2026
Definition of tugging
Verb
  • In the Johnson administration, that has taken a back seat to extracting cash from those deemed by these redistributionists as having too much of it.
    — The Editorial Board, Chicago Tribune, 22 Oct. 2026
  • For supporters, the proposal represents an emergency fiscal response aimed at temporarily extracting revenue from unprecedented concentrations of wealth.
    — Trevor Laurence Jockims, CNBC, 22 Oct. 2026
Definition of extracting

Browse Nearby Words

pull in
pulling
pulling a face
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Cite this Entry

“Pulling.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/pulling. Accessed 30 Oct. 2026.

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