as in bumping
to come into usually forceful contact with something
the snowball thudded against the side of my car
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
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Recent Examples of thudding
The latest version kicks off with a moody set piece before a gun shot and thudding drums make way for a beat that sounds like a drowning beeper.
—
Craig Jenkins, Vulture, 2 Dec. 2025
The early-career excitement Spielberg generated with Duel, The Sugarland Express, Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind came to a thudding halt with the frenetically busy, hopelessly bloated war comedy, 1941.
—David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 20 Nov. 2025
Producers Mufasa and Yvng Gucci seamlessly pull off morphing the skittering drums of a somewhat generic UK drill beat into a thudding bouyon rhythm for Guadeloupean trio HollyG to run amok over.
—Alphonse Pierre, Pitchfork, 6 Nov. 2025
Here’s where the treadmill picks up and our steps start thudding on the track.
—Steven Louis Goldstein, New York Times, 8 Oct. 2025
In 2016, when Bad Bunny first emerged, he was identified with a style known as Latin trap, a woozy and thudding hybrid that owes something to American hip-hop.
—Kelefa Sanneh, New Yorker, 17 Sep. 2025
That naturalistic, lo-fi approach might play just fine were Maxine not saddled with a heavy, thudding cancer arc.
—Richard Lawson, IndieWire, 7 Sep. 2025
With daily departures from Chicago Union station, the superliner service rumbles through Illinois chasing mile after mile of golden-red corn fields before thudding over the Mississippi river into Iowa.
—Monisha Rajesh, Condé Nast Traveler, 18 Oct. 2022
Craig Jenkins, Vulture, 2 Dec. 2025
The early-career excitement Spielberg generated with Duel, The Sugarland Express, Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind came to a thudding halt with the frenetically busy, hopelessly bloated war comedy, 1941.
—David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 20 Nov. 2025
Producers Mufasa and Yvng Gucci seamlessly pull off morphing the skittering drums of a somewhat generic UK drill beat into a thudding bouyon rhythm for Guadeloupean trio HollyG to run amok over.
—Alphonse Pierre, Pitchfork, 6 Nov. 2025
Here’s where the treadmill picks up and our steps start thudding on the track.
—Steven Louis Goldstein, New York Times, 8 Oct. 2025
In 2016, when Bad Bunny first emerged, he was identified with a style known as Latin trap, a woozy and thudding hybrid that owes something to American hip-hop.
—Kelefa Sanneh, New Yorker, 17 Sep. 2025
That naturalistic, lo-fi approach might play just fine were Maxine not saddled with a heavy, thudding cancer arc.
—Richard Lawson, IndieWire, 7 Sep. 2025
With daily departures from Chicago Union station, the superliner service rumbles through Illinois chasing mile after mile of golden-red corn fields before thudding over the Mississippi river into Iowa.
—Monisha Rajesh, Condé Nast Traveler, 18 Oct. 2022
Recent Examples of Synonyms for thudding
Verb
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This project is focused on bumping the agency’s operations to include 30 ten-car trains per hour, or more than 300 additional railcars total, alongside other improvements such as a new control system, a new railcar storage yard in Hayward and adding more power substations to improve service.—
Kyle Martin,
Mercury News,
5 Feb. 2026
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But Highway 61 remains a destination for travelers bumping the long way around the Americana Music Triangle between New Orleans, Memphis and Nashville.—
Joe Sills,
Forbes.com,
30 Jan. 2026
Verb
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My ten-year-old granddaughter was marching and banging her little saucepan with a salad spoon.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
29 Jan. 2026
-
Online posts questioning the city’s account continued into the week, and protesters have kept returning to the Hyatt, banging pots and chanting in subfreezing temperatures.—
Emiliano Tahui Gómez,
Austin American Statesman,
27 Jan. 2026
Verb
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The latter was also something Garcia took issue with Friday, slamming the Justice Department for continuing to withhold some of the files.—
Kevin Rector,
Los Angeles Times,
31 Jan. 2026
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Thomas then appeared to quickly lunge at Leon, swiftly grabbing and lifting him up before body slamming the suspect to the ground.—
Bonny Chu,
FOXNews.com,
30 Jan. 2026
Verb
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Recent protests amid corruption scandals, elite clan fissures, and governance failures suggest that nostalgia is again colliding with reality.—
Alejandro Reyes,
Washington Post,
3 Feb. 2026
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Fear, anger and solidarity are colliding across Minneapolis, as residents describe a city where daily life now relies on warnings and mutual care.—
Alaa Elassar,
CNN Money,
2 Feb. 2026
Verb
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By smashing together heavy atoms of lead traveling at near-light speeds using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), scientists can create a high-energy environment that briefly frees gluons and quarks from this atomic bondage, recreating the quark-gluon plasma of the early universe.—
Robert Lea,
Space.com,
30 Jan. 2026
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Repurposing waste heat The launch of the system marked the first time that the Large Hadron Collider, better known for smashing protons at near-light speeds, has been tapped as a renewable thermal source.—
Georgina Jedikovska,
Interesting Engineering,
29 Jan. 2026
Verb
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Norway suffered a second blow this week as racer Fredrik Moeller was taken to the hospital after crashing in the men’s first downhill training run today.—
Kevin Collier,
NBC news,
4 Feb. 2026
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The center was the first acquisition of the 2021 roster rebuild for Artūras Karnišovas, who took a major swing to craft a roster that climbed to the top of the Eastern Conference before crashing out of a first-round series with the Milwaukee Bucks in the 2022 playoffs.—
Julia Poe,
Chicago Tribune,
4 Feb. 2026
Verb
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Even 6 inches of moving water can pose a serious risk of knocking you off your feet.—
NC Weather Bot,
Charlotte Observer,
30 Jan. 2026
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Private bankers wealth managers and people looking for seed money will all come knocking.—
Lien De Pau,
Forbes.com,
30 Jan. 2026
Verb
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From swastikas at a playground in Borough Park to a car ramming at Chabad headquarters in Crown Heights, the Jewish community in NYC is very much on edge.—
Jesse Zanger,
CBS News,
3 Feb. 2026
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Martinez’s case has been one of the most high-profile examples of civilians being accused by federal authorities of ramming into a vehicle driven by immigration agents.—
Suzanne Gamboa,
NBC news,
3 Feb. 2026
Cite this Entry
“Thudding.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/thudding. Accessed 6 Feb. 2026.
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