1
as in pulling
to cause to follow by applying steady force on
tugged on the door until it opened
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in laboring
to devote serious and sustained effort
she's tugged all her life to get to where she is now in the business world
Synonyms & Similar Words
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of tugging
Her reporting turns the accident into an albatross around their necks, tearing at their reputations and tugging at all the other skeletons in their closets.
—
Angie Han, HollywoodReporter, 14 Oct. 2025
Jagger practically broke into a trot down the carpet, tugging girlfriend Melanie Hamrick along.
—Leigh Nordstrom, Footwear News, 9 Oct. 2025
Then, a black bear creeps in through the brush and begins tugging, pulling, and sinking its two-inch teeth into the carcass.
—Madison Dapcevich, Outside, 8 Oct. 2025
Guardiola was agitated that Van Hecke went to ground inside his own penalty area in a shirt-tugging duel with Erling Haaland.
—Andy Naylor, New York Times, 6 Oct. 2025
The heart-tugging comedy is a point of pride for Johansson, 40, who hopes to set an example to her kids by stepping behind the camera and chasing her dreams.
—Patrick Ryan, USA Today, 27 Sep. 2025
Somebody’s now in a headlock, and there’s a surge of packed bodies moving in a swelling tide of shirt-tugging and shouting.
—Jonathan Terrell, Rolling Stone, 23 Sep. 2025
This time, the dogs only experienced each toy’s function (either tugging or fetching) during play; they were not taught words for any of them.
—Anirban Mukhopadhyay, Scientific American, 18 Sep. 2025
Something must force the system into the new state, just like the woman gently tugging on Zeeman’s catastrophe machine.
—Gregory Barber, Quanta Magazine, 15 Sep. 2025
Angie Han, HollywoodReporter, 14 Oct. 2025
Jagger practically broke into a trot down the carpet, tugging girlfriend Melanie Hamrick along.
—Leigh Nordstrom, Footwear News, 9 Oct. 2025
Then, a black bear creeps in through the brush and begins tugging, pulling, and sinking its two-inch teeth into the carcass.
—Madison Dapcevich, Outside, 8 Oct. 2025
Guardiola was agitated that Van Hecke went to ground inside his own penalty area in a shirt-tugging duel with Erling Haaland.
—Andy Naylor, New York Times, 6 Oct. 2025
The heart-tugging comedy is a point of pride for Johansson, 40, who hopes to set an example to her kids by stepping behind the camera and chasing her dreams.
—Patrick Ryan, USA Today, 27 Sep. 2025
Somebody’s now in a headlock, and there’s a surge of packed bodies moving in a swelling tide of shirt-tugging and shouting.
—Jonathan Terrell, Rolling Stone, 23 Sep. 2025
This time, the dogs only experienced each toy’s function (either tugging or fetching) during play; they were not taught words for any of them.
—Anirban Mukhopadhyay, Scientific American, 18 Sep. 2025
Something must force the system into the new state, just like the woman gently tugging on Zeeman’s catastrophe machine.
—Gregory Barber, Quanta Magazine, 15 Sep. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for tugging
Verb
-
The Marigold Room, just off the lobby, is an intimate music space and listening room for just 150 guests that’s already pulling national touring acts.—
Jennifer Bradley Franklin,
Travel + Leisure,
21 Oct. 2025
-
Langham stopped the truck by pulling Hagen’s leg off the gas pedal and pushing the brake pedal with her hand.—
KC Baker,
PEOPLE,
21 Oct. 2025
Verb
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With The Fulfillment, the sub-context is how clout culture is a currency, how attention itself has become a currency, just like our laboring bodies are.—
Christopher Claxton,
Billboard,
19 Sep. 2025
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While such a scenario sounds potentially maudlin and manipulative, Lucero — who wrote the film from a personal place — never allows that to happen by making the characters complex and flawed, and laboring under real-life issues.—
Randy Myers,
Mercury News,
12 Sep. 2025
Verb
-
Begging or drunkenness could mean a week to a couple of months on a chain gang, grading and paving roads, fixing bridges, hauling debris, and otherwise helping to construct the fast-growing city.—
JSTOR Daily,
JSTOR Daily,
21 Oct. 2025
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Bands of masked men apprehending people in broad daylight in the streets and hauling them off.—
J. David McSwane,
ProPublica,
18 Oct. 2025
Verb
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That was punctuated by the incident in Dubai, which Raducanu said left her struggling to breathe properly in the immediate aftermath.—
Charlie Eccleshare,
New York Times,
16 Oct. 2025
-
The film follows Malik (Omar Epps), a gifted athlete struggling academically; Kristen (Kristy Swanson), a young woman discovering her voice; and Remy (Michael Rapaport), a student whose isolation turns dangerous.—
Okla Jones,
Essence,
16 Oct. 2025
Verb
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With the shutdown dragging on, GOP leaders in Congress will have to decide soon whether to extend that date, and by how much.—
Bart Jansen,
USA Today,
21 Oct. 2025
-
The comments came deep into the third week of the shutdown, which is dragging on with no clear end in sight amid a partisan fight in the Senate over federal funding priorities.—
Kevin Breuninger,
CNBC,
20 Oct. 2025
Verb
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And then a lot of just striving for success.—
Erin Clack,
PEOPLE,
19 Oct. 2025
-
The Utah Jazz have waived a former elite lottery prospect who is now striving to just carve out a rotation role on an NBA roster.—
MSNBC Newsweek,
MSNBC Newsweek,
17 Oct. 2025
Verb
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For years, Bloom was hyped as a Silicon Valley unicorn, but in 2012 the SEC charged an investment bank working with Bloom of using inflated numbers to mislead investors.—
Jordan Blum,
Fortune,
16 Oct. 2025
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Christiaan Triebert is a Times reporter working on the Visual Investigations team, a group that combines traditional reporting with digital sleuthing and analysis of visual evidence to verify and source facts from around the world.—
Danny Makki,
New York Times,
16 Oct. 2025
Verb
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Israel’s foreign minister has accused Hamas of trying to use the hostages’ bodies as leverage.—
Ibrahim Dahman,
CNN Money,
18 Oct. 2025
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On the yacht, and in the camera’s gaze, all are equal, and all are having their moment, just trying to get through another day.—
Naomi Fry,
New Yorker,
18 Oct. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Tugging.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/tugging. Accessed 22 Oct. 2025.
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