as in eavesdropping
Related Words
Relevance
Dissimilar Words
as in gawking
to look long and hard in wonder or surprise
thoughtless drivers pausing on the highway to rubberneck at the accident
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 rubbernecking
Kris Habermehl,
CBS News,
4 May 2026
Instead, Malinin popped his quad axel, the beginning of four minutes that started to feel like rubbernecking a car accident.
—
Dana O’Neil,
CNN Money,
14 Feb. 2026
The whole of football is rubbernecking in their direction.
—
Daniel Taylor,
New York Times,
17 Jan. 2026
Verb
As a result, traffic between Morton Grove and Skokie has slowed to a crawl, and on the inbound side there has also been a slowdown due to rubbernecking.
—
Kris Habermehl,
CBS News,
4 May 2026
Instead, Malinin popped his quad axel, the beginning of four minutes that started to feel like rubbernecking a car accident.
—
Dana O’Neil,
CNN Money,
14 Feb. 2026
The whole of football is rubbernecking in their direction.
—
Daniel Taylor,
New York Times,
17 Jan. 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for rubbernecking
Noun
-
He was charged with five felony counts of eavesdropping, 23 misdemeanor counts of secretly filming another person and three misdemeanor counts of unlawful dissemination of private recordings.
-
The staff of Sermitsiaq had taken to leaving their phones outside editorial meetings, for fear of eavesdropping by the United States.
Verb
-
Instead, the skin-frying Friday saw common flow of people going through, gawking at the large screens and a group of sailors allowing some passing by to do pull-ups from a bar.
-
The walk to the stadium is a mile or so along the Alaskan Way, where restaurants like the Crab Pot are opening up, but everyone is gawking at the street spectacle.
Noun
-
It was destroyed in the name of urban renewal and has borne the brunt of government interference and disinvestment.
-
The ruling retained the Fed’s special status in the government that shields it from interference by the White House—now or in the future.
Verb
-
The banners of Hightower green burning in the night, Rhaenyra staring ominously through the flames.
-
Now, yes, staring at the ceiling long enough to draw you a diagram of the paint peeling.
Noun
-
That seemed to work for a while, but now his intrusiveness is ramping up again.
Verb
-
Isn’t that what any of us wants when gazing into the mirror held up to nature, as Hamlet describes the theater?
-
Soul gazing The following morning, the participants wake up with maybe the clearest heads in Nashville.
Noun
-
Border officers have broad discretion, and retirees who spend lengthy periods in the country can face additional questioning.
-
Justices posed various hypothetical questions throughout and, at times, got into tense lines of questioning while trying to understand the attorneys’ arguments and what previous cases reflect about this one.
Noun
-
The bathroom is encased with polycarbonate walls to let in light but keep out prying eyes.
-
It’s often viewed as a dumping ground for human refuse — out of sight, out of mind — and it is structured to prevent prying eyes.
Cite this Entry
“Rubbernecking.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/rubbernecking. Accessed 6 Jul. 2026.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
