assuage
Americanverb (used with object)
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assuages,
present (3rd person singular)
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assuaged,
past participle, past
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assuaging
present participle
verb
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to soothe, moderate, or relieve (grief, pain, etc)
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to give relief to (thirst, appetite, etc); satisfy
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to pacify; calm
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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assuagesimple
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assuagessimple
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have assuagedperfect
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has assuagedperfect
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am assuagingprogressive
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are assuagingprogressive
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is assuagingprogressive
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have been assuagingperfect progressive
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has been assuagingperfect progressive
Past
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assuagedsimple
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had assuagedperfect
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was assuagingprogressive
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were assuagingprogressive
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had been assuagingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of assuage
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English aswagen, from Old French asouagier, from unrecorded Vulgar Latin assuāviāre, equivalent to Latin as- as- + -suāviāre, verbal derivative of Latin suāvis “agreeable to the taste, pleasant” ( cf. suave; akin to sweet )
Explanation
If you assuage an unpleasant feeling, you make it go away. Assuaging your hunger by eating a bag of marshmallows may cause you other unpleasant feelings. The most common things that we assuage are fears, concerns, guilt, grief, anxiety, and anger. That makes a lot of sense — these are all things we seek relief from. The word comes from Old French assouagier, from the Latin root suavis, "sweet" — think of adding a bit of honey to something unpleasant. A word with a similar meaning is mollify.
Vocabulary lists containing assuage
100 SAT Words Beginning with "A"
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To Kill a Mockingbird
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The Giver
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The result has left many in Michigan’s Jewish community wary of El-Sayed and looking for outreach from him and his campaign to assuage their concerns.
From Slate ● Aug. 20, 2026
Given how strong both Nvidia and Broadcom expect AI growth to be in the next few years, Li said the recent announcements “may help to assuage supply concerns” for the companies.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 27, 2026
Those comments appeared intended to assuage investors who’ve grown concerned that people could be spending less time on the streaming service as rivals like YouTube gain market share.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 16, 2026
But the announcement will assuage concerns raised by previous speculation that the World Cup final halftime show itself could stretch for as long as 25 minutes.
From Barron's ● Jul. 8, 2026
“This is to assuage our conscience, darling,” she would explain to Blanca.
From "The House of the Spirits: A Novel" by Isabel Allende
Tuesday's move assuages what had been growing frustration at the lack of a big picture vision from the Labour government.
From BBC ● Jan. 14, 2026
Squirreling the creature home in her backpack, she assuages its hissing-and-squawking terror with some simple nursing, then decides the right thing to do is reunite her new friend with its family.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 18, 2025
What she notices about pizza is that pizza “is like a smiling face: It assuages the fear of complexity by showing everything on its surface.”
From New York Times ● Feb. 3, 2024
A sort of penance, where by reading all the nasty comments under every post she assuages some of her guilt, as a zealot whips himself bloody to atone for sin?
From Slate ● Jan. 31, 2024
So true is it that faith in a promise, whether human or divine, assuages grief, lifts the darkening cloud, and often opens up a fountain of joy.
From Memoirs of Orange Jacobs by Orange Jacobs
Nor has the boom in stock prices assuaged discontent.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026
That hasn’t assuaged concerns among some that a dot-com-style bubble may be building, especially given the sharp run-up.
From MarketWatch ● May 28, 2026
In an instant, Urbina’s fears had been assuaged.
From Salon ● May 2, 2026
That was partly assuaged when the cast, made up of up-and-coming talent rather than established names, was announced.
From BBC ● Mar. 22, 2026
He was not assuaged by the more charitable opinion of his superior, Rutherford, who was delighted with Lawrence’s spirit in defending his results.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Given the stock’s retreat over recent months, stronger-than-expected results, amid low expectations, “could go a long way in assuaging several of these investor concerns.”
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 15, 2026
The goal was to provide enterprise customers more powerful tools while assuaging the White House’s concerns that they could be weaponized by bad actors.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 16, 2026
The presence of the Ivorian army in the remote and long-neglected northeast, hundreds of kilometres from the economic capital Abidjan, has succeeded in assuaging locals' concerns -- to an extent.
From Barron's ● Oct. 20, 2025
"A sincere apology would acknowledge that grievance and, in my view, would go some way to assuaging the sense of injustice," he said.
From BBC ● Oct. 18, 2024
During the first months of their marriage, he called Celia every night, his gentle voice assuaging her.
From "Dreaming in Cuban" by Cristina García
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
