as in to smear
to put a thick layer of a liquid, cream, etc. over (something)
We ate lobster slathered with butter. She slathered her skin with sunscreen.
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Dissimilar Words
as in gobs
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of slather
Hailee Catalano, Bon Appetit Magazine, 23 Jan. 2026
Chef Jose Avila has served the Pambazo de Carnitas — the bread slathered and marinated in a red guajillo chili sauce — for six years, first from his food truck and since 2021 at his flagship Denver restaurant, La Diabla Pozole y Mezcal.
—Miguel Otárola, Denver Post, 20 Jan. 2026
Merrill Shindler, Daily News, 1 Oct. 2025
Delicately slather on Davines OI Oil to add shine and softness to wet or dry hair without weighing it down, especially if hair is feeling extra coarse.
—Jenny Berg, Vogue, 22 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for slather
Verb
Let cool for 5 minutes, and enjoy warm, slathered with the Calabrian Chile Honey Butter and/or drizzled with honey.
—Hailee Catalano, Bon Appetit Magazine, 23 Jan. 2026
Chef Jose Avila has served the Pambazo de Carnitas — the bread slathered and marinated in a red guajillo chili sauce — for six years, first from his food truck and since 2021 at his flagship Denver restaurant, La Diabla Pozole y Mezcal.
—Miguel Otárola, Denver Post, 20 Jan. 2026
Noun
In the meantime, a slather of guaca-salsa does just fine.
—Merrill Shindler, Daily News, 1 Oct. 2025
Delicately slather on Davines OI Oil to add shine and softness to wet or dry hair without weighing it down, especially if hair is feeling extra coarse.
—Jenny Berg, Vogue, 22 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for slather
Recent Examples of Synonyms for slather
Verb
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Robert Pattinson is unrecognizable with a long blonde hair transformation and lipstick smeared all over his face in a new photoshoot.—
Rachel Burchfield,
InStyle,
17 Feb. 2026
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Outdated Vanity Lights Is your vanity light caked in dust and smeared with eight different paint colors from two decades of DIY paint jobs?—
Marisa Suzanne Martin,
The Spruce,
16 Feb. 2026
Noun
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There are gobs of money to be made selling enterprise software, but dulling the impact of AI is also a useful feint.—
Josh Tyrangiel,
The Atlantic,
10 Feb. 2026
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Its 20 rooms encompass nearly 8,500 square feet of living space and include five bedrooms, six full bathrooms, one half-bathroom, two laundry rooms, three stairways, two breakfast bars and gobs of closet space.—
Mike Klingaman,
Baltimore Sun,
3 Feb. 2026
Verb
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Buddhist-Taoist Japan, anointed as a new giant in Clash, has all but withdrawn from the stage.—
Josef Joffe,
The Atlantic,
14 Feb. 2026
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At least one competitor is already anointing Stolz, a seven-time world champ who’s just 21— and only halfway through the Olympic program in Milan—the best ever.—
Sean Gregory,
Time,
14 Feb. 2026
Noun
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Over the past week, a slew of cinematic videos of celebrities and characters in absurd situations have gone viral online, with one commonality –– they were created using a new artificial intelligence tool from Chinese developer ByteDance, sparking anxiety over the fast-evolving capabilities of AI.—
Stephanie Yang,
CNN Money,
20 Feb. 2026
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Gu has a slew of sponsorships, from global brands such as Porsche to Chinese companies such as Anta Sports that are less well known outside of China.—
Rafael Nam,
NPR,
19 Feb. 2026
Verb
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Soften Stuck-On Batter If the batter is burnt and just won't budge, dab it with a couple of drops of cooking oil.—
Mary Marlowe Leverette,
The Spruce,
15 Feb. 2026
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Then, use a makeup sponge to dab pink into the center of the nail for an aura effect.—
Kara Jillian Brown,
InStyle,
31 Jan. 2026
Noun
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So at the trade deadline, general manager Onsi Saleh sent him to Golden State in exchange for, essentially, a stack of poker chips.—
Ken Sugiura,
AJC.com,
18 Feb. 2026
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Nebius’ advantage comes from the company’s position in scaling in the scarcest part of the software stack — powered data center capacity — and its ability to turn GPU investment into usable clusters as customer demand grows, wrote analyst Michael Donovan.—
Lisa Kailai Han,
CNBC,
18 Feb. 2026
Verb
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To celebrate, the president wants to offer free admissions that day to the country’s national parks, a self-serving gesture, no doubt, but one that is no surprise for a man who spent much of his adult life plastering his name on the sides of buildings, airplanes and casino hotels.—
Leonard Greene,
Mercury News,
27 Dec. 2025
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In one scene, Gracie Abrams texts Taylor a picture of the singer plastered on the side of a hotel in Indianapolis.—
Maya Georgi,
Rolling Stone,
23 Dec. 2025
Noun
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What piles up now melts gradually through spring and summer, feeding rivers, farms, and household taps long after the clouds clear.—
James Ward,
USA Today,
18 Feb. 2026
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In sheer dollar terms, the pile of money owed by the government is projected under the CBO’s baseline scenario to balloon from nearly $31 trillion today to a staggering $56 trillion over the next decade.—
Nick Lichtenberg,
Fortune,
17 Feb. 2026
Cite this Entry
“Slather.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/slather. Accessed 22 Feb. 2026.
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