RETREATING Synonyms: 78 Similar and Opposite Words

retreating

verb

present participle of retreat

as in withdrawing

to move back or away (as from something difficult, dangerous, or disagreeable) we retreated to the safety of the cellar at the first sign of the tornado

Synonyms & Similar Words

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms

as in fleeing

to hasten away from something dangerous or frightening the untried soldiers retreated in humiliating disarray almost as soon as the enemy's onslaught began

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 retreating But Jewish security is not achieved by retreating from the rest of New York. — Mark Treyger, New York Daily News, 8 Sep. 2026 The Himalayas are warming rapidly, glaciers are retreating and rainfall and snowfall patterns are shifting. — ABC News, 7 Sep. 2026 There was television, which, starting in the nineteen-fifties, kept kids indoors; also, houses got a lot bigger, and families smaller, so that most kids suddenly had the option of retreating to their own bedrooms. — Joshua Rothman, New Yorker, 4 Sep. 2026 Allgood enjoys retreating to the privacy of her own room after a busy day. — Kathleen Wong, USA Today, 2 Sep. 2026 Stepping into the public sphere rather than retreating became both a survival strategy and a refuge—an assertion of political and artistic self-determination. — Elisa R. Linn, Artforum, 1 Sep. 2026 The player reported that the man had opened a knife and moved toward him before retreating into his room. — Peter Chawaga, Forbes.com, 29 Aug. 2026 Or Pablo Picasso, goaded into radicalism by the latest bizarre creations of Matisse, retreating to the Spanish mountain village of Gósol and, mere months later, beginning work on his proto-cubist masterpiece, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. — Sebastian Smee, The Atlantic, 27 Aug. 2026 Achord is in the huddle every play before retreating to the sideline. — Matt Schneidman, New York Times, 25 Aug. 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for retreating

Verb

Van Aert’s victory extends his lead over Brennan to 65 points in the uncompetitive green jersey contest, with his only realistic rival, Lidl-Trek’s Mads Pedersen, withdrawing from the race earlier this week.

— Jacob Whitehead, New York Times, 4 Sep. 2026
The council eventually agreed in May to delay implementation of the minimum wage increase by 18 months in exchange for the business coalition withdrawing the gross receipts measure.

— Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 1 Sep. 2026

Definition of withdrawing

Verb

Step Back Kenya has long been a refuge for people fleeing conflicts in neighboring countries, from Somalia and Sudan in the early 1990s to South Sudan, Burundi and the DR Congo.

— Vivianne Wandera, semafor.com, 9 Sep. 2026
Masson credited the town’s surveillance cameras with capturing the fleeing pair abandoning at least one of the paintings and the city’s police force with a quick response.

— News Desk, Artforum, 8 Sep. 2026

Definition of fleeing

Verb

Peden has their own professional flying grooms that travel with the horses for championships and Olympic flights, while there are also vets and stable grooms, such as Vard on board.

— Danielle Rossingh, New York Times, 9 Sep. 2026
Roundabout 100, most of them leased, flying more than double that number in flights each day to destinations across the globe.

— Andrew Nusca, Fortune, 8 Sep. 2026

Definition of flying

Verb

Involves engineering hurdles Building solar farms on open water involves far more engineering hurdles than bolting panels onto dry land.

— Aman Tripathi, Interesting Engineering, 21 Aug. 2026
Above all, embed accuracy into explainability rather than bolting it on afterward.

— Sriram Bhargav Madhav, Forbes.com, 17 Aug. 2026

Definition of bolting

Verb

The film, which will include stop-motion animation and live-action sequences, is an adaptation of Shane Jones’ cult novel exploring the tension between escaping war through imagination and confronting its reality.

— Alexandra Patterson, Variety, 3 Sep. 2026
The tiny, colorful birds will spend winter in Mexico and Central America, escaping the cold and snow in Michigan, before returning in spring 2027.

— Jenna Prestininzi, Freep.com, 1 Sep. 2026

Definition of escaping

Verb

Detroit, of course, still ranks as one of the better base-running teams in the league.

— Cody Stavenhagen, New York Times, 8 Sep. 2026
Before running for governor, Acton had been recruited by DeWine in 2019 to lead the Ohio Department of Health while serving as an associate professor of public health at Ohio State University.

— Gary Fields, Los Angeles Times, 7 Sep. 2026