1
as in complaining
to make often peevish criticisms or objections about matters that are minor, unimportant, or irrelevant
he spent the entire evening quibbling about the historical inaccuracies in the television series on World War II
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in bickering
to express different opinions about something often angrily
don't quibble over who gets to sit in front
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
as in nitpicking
Related Words
Dissimilar Words
as in ambiguity
Related Words
Dissimilar Words
Example Sentences
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to
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Recent Examples of quibbling
Jodie Cook, Forbes.com, 25 Aug. 2025
Owen Gleiberman, Variety, 10 Sep. 2025
When the murder of 100,000 people, many of them women and children, is mentioned or denounced, or when someone dares to use terms such as genocide, ethnocide, ethnic cleansing or similar, most people choose to take issue with the characterization, quibbling over semantics.
—Uriel Kon
september 2, Literary Hub, 2 Sep. 2025
Verb
More support tickets, more quibbling, more negotiating.
—Jodie Cook, Forbes.com, 25 Aug. 2025
Noun
Joy Randolph and John Early, as the two Afterlife Coordinators, have a quibbling charisma, but the movie should have done more with all its possible versions of paradise, figuring out how to use them comedically instead of just as easy punchlines.
—Owen Gleiberman, Variety, 10 Sep. 2025
When the murder of 100,000 people, many of them women and children, is mentioned or denounced, or when someone dares to use terms such as genocide, ethnocide, ethnic cleansing or similar, most people choose to take issue with the characterization, quibbling over semantics.
—Uriel Kon
september 2, Literary Hub, 2 Sep. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for quibbling
Verb
-
And the truth is, other nations should stop complaining — and start learning.—
Nick Lichtenberg,
Fortune,
1 Oct. 2025
-
Thus, unlike disgruntled newspaper readers, whose only resort was to write an angry letter to the editor, radio listeners could now vent their frustrations by going over the heads of a local affiliate and complaining directly to the government.—
Thomas Doherty,
HollywoodReporter,
30 Sep. 2025
Verb
-
Jennifer Aniston’s Alex Levy, Reese Witherspoon’s Bradley Jackson, and the other members of The Morning Show’s newsroom and its network are once again bickering and backstabbing.—
Emma Alpern,
Vulture,
11 Sep. 2025
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Coaches are also bickering about money, a topic that would have felt out of place 10 years ago.—
Eben Novy-Williams,
Sportico.com,
5 Sep. 2025
Noun
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The composition has many hallmarks of surrealism, including dream logic – the strange, flowing and often illogical progression of images reflecting the unpredictable nature of dreams – metamorphosis and psychic ambiguity.—
Sally Jane Brown,
The Conversation,
29 Sep. 2025
-
The ambiguity of authorship is meant to unsettle the reading of the text.—
Lana Lin
September 29,
Literary Hub,
29 Sep. 2025
Verb
-
Venus in Virgo loves precision, but be careful not to slide into scarcity thinking or nitpicking your progress.—
Dossé-Via Trenou,
Refinery29,
14 Sep. 2025
-
That might seem like nitpicking, except this is a franchise that has had the luxury of starting-caliber linemen as reserves.—
Zach Berman,
New York Times,
17 Aug. 2025
Verb
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For decades, DeLodder said, hospitals have quelled the establishment of freestanding birthing centers by arguing against their necessity.—
Killian Baarlaer,
Louisville Courier Journal,
3 Oct. 2025
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The budget director wrote the project’s chapter on the Executive Office of the President, arguing that the bureaucracy is riddled with inefficiencies and corruption.—
Emily Hallas,
The Washington Examiner,
2 Oct. 2025
Adjective
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In a subtler interpretation of the trend, the Jazz bookshelf is handcrafted in oak that takes on a golden hue when hit with the right light.—
Rachel Gallaher,
Robb Report,
4 Oct. 2025
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Cohen and other researchers have identified many subtle fixes that improve kids’ eating habits.—
Jessica Winter,
New Yorker,
4 Oct. 2025
Noun
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The vessel was operating in international waters but that added to the murkiness of the legal justification.—
Emily Goodin,
Miami Herald,
5 Sep. 2025
-
Many technological challenges abound in the murkiness of natural language chatting.—
Lance Eliot,
Forbes.com,
29 Aug. 2025
Verb
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With five blades sandwiched between two moisturizing bars, this razor speeds up the entire process (no fussing around with shaving cream), nourishing dry skin and making nicks a rare occurrence.—
Sophia Panych,
Allure,
16 Sep. 2025
-
This was the mid 1980s and tandem skydiving hadn’t been popularized yet, so his father, Roger, adjusted accordingly by stuffing carpet padding into the leg pads to stop him from fussing.—
Angelina Liu,
People.com,
2 Sep. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Quibbling.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/quibbling. Accessed 9 Oct. 2025.
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