wrest

1
as in to pry
to draw out by force or with effort the boy wrested the book out of his sister's hands

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2
as in to extort
to get (as money) by the use of force or threats vowed that the bully had wrested his lunch money from him for the last time

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3
as in to earn
to get with great difficulty farmers who were used to wresting a living from the harsh land

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4
5
as in to grab
to separate or remove by forceful pulling wrested open the stuck door of the cabinet

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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 wrest Soon thereafter, Russia wrested control of two restive regions of Georgia, effectively preventing the country’s accession to NATO. Charles Kupchan, Foreign Affairs, 20 June 2025 Cornyn's challenge will be to wrest significant numbers of those voters back to his side. John C. Moritz, Austin American Statesman, 30 July 2025 Set in the tumultuous early twenty-tens, as Brazil prepared for the World Cup and the Olympics, the novel tracks how Rocinha changes as military police push into the neighborhood, attempting to wrest control from powerful local gangs. The New Yorker, New Yorker, 28 July 2025 But there is still an opportunity to wrest a positive outcome from the current tumult. Emily Kilcrease, Foreign Affairs, 9 June 2025 See All Example Sentences for wrest
Recent Examples of Synonyms for wrest
Verb
  • According to Gomez’s complaint, the woman sought to extort money from him and his law firm, Gomez Trial Attorneys, and to damage their reputations.
    Jeff McDonald, San Diego Union-Tribune, 15 Aug. 2025
  • Correia was convicted in 2021 of 21 counts for defrauding investors in a smartphone app, extorting money from marijuana companies, and lying to the IRS.
    Lance Reynolds, Boston Herald, 8 Aug. 2025
Verb
  • Mason Miller, the marquee acquisition at last week’s trade deadline, mixed a two-out walk among his three strikeouts in the bottom of the ninth to earn his first save with the Padres.
    Kevin Acee, San Diego Union-Tribune, 7 Aug. 2025
  • The new, special tax break on tips is retroactive and applies to eligible tip income earned in all of 2025.
    Susan Tompor, Freep.com, 7 Aug. 2025
Verb
  • Brands began to pull together resources to support refugees.
    Stephan Rabimov, Forbes, 13 Feb. 2023
  • The 13-minute performance will likely call for a healthy dose of vibrant, colored lighting to pull it all together.
    Kelly Allen, House Beautiful, 10 Feb. 2023
Verb
  • Four prisoners had to take turns using a bunk bed just to grab a few hours of sleep.
    Michael Collins, USA Today, 18 Aug. 2025
  • But Sunday, unfortunately for him, slipped away quickly as World No. 1 grabbed his fifth season title.
    Devlina Sarkar, MSNBC Newsweek, 18 Aug. 2025
Verb
  • In a work as captivated with pastoral landscapes as the haunting glow of a tube TV, Vermette extracts possibility from every shot, down to crossfading that recalls the expressiveness of silent cinema.
    Christian Zilko, IndieWire, 7 Aug. 2025
  • Running a raw-level recovery tool to scan the entire disk and extract the PST file.
    Chongwei Chen, Forbes.com, 7 Aug. 2025
Verb
  • Ewers was impressive finding A.J. Henning on one throw and squeezed a pass into a tight window to running back Ollie Gordon II.
    David Furones, Sun Sentinel, 15 Aug. 2025
  • To squeeze all this into exactly 100 days between Wrexham staging a promotion party after last season had ended and Tuesday’s cup tie against Hull is impressive.
    Richard Sutcliffe, New York Times, 15 Aug. 2025
Verb
  • Social media posts obtained by the AP that day showed Vance kayaking on the river, which feeds into Ohio's Caesar Creek Lake.
    Charlotte Phillipp, People.com, 8 Aug. 2025
  • The group’s pamphlets didn’t present the gaining of political rights as a moral good in and of itself, but rather as a means to obtain greater security, resources, and influence.
    Time, Time, 7 Aug. 2025
Verb
  • Literally, this has been tugging at me for 29 years.
    Ryan Coleman Published, EW.com, 4 Aug. 2025
  • Gravity is tugging at the sloped part of your roof.
    Tim Carter, Hartford Courant, 19 July 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Wrest.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/wrest. Accessed 20 Aug. 2025.

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