coerce
Americanverb (used with object)
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coerces,
present (3rd person singular)
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coerced,
past participle, past
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coercing
present participle
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to compel by force, intimidation, or authority, especially without regard for individual desire or volition.
They coerced him into signing the document.
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to bring about through the use of force or other forms of compulsion; exact.
to coerce obedience.
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to dominate or control, especially by exploiting fear, anxiety, etc..
The state is based on successfully coercing the individual.
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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coercesimple
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coercessimple
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have coercedperfect
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has coercedperfect
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am coercingprogressive
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are coercingprogressive
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is coercingprogressive
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have been coercingperfect progressive
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has been coercingperfect progressive
Past
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coercedsimple
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had coercedperfect
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was coercingprogressive
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were coercingprogressive
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had been coercingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of coerce
First recorded in 1425–75; late Middle English, from Latin coercēre “to hold in, restrain,” equivalent to co- co- + -ercēre, combining form of arcēre “to keep in, keep away,” akin to arca ark
Explanation
You can bring a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. You can coerce — or pressure — someone to attend your office holiday party, but you can't make him have fun. If you're at a point where you feel like you need to coerce someone into doing something, it might be more civilized to just give up. To coerce is to manipulate, use aggressive arguments, pressure unfairly, or threaten — really, this isn't very civilized behavior, is it? Handy synonyms for this verb include force and pressure. In a gangster film, you might hear a character say he "put the squeeze" on someone — another way of saying he coerced them.
Vocabulary lists containing coerce
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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:
Vullo, in which the court held that the government cannot use informal tactics, like thinly-veiled threats of selective enforcement or demands for cooperation, to coerce private actors.
From Salon ● Jul. 10, 2026
Seong-Hyon Lee, a visiting scholar at the Harvard University Asia Center, also said Beijing is shifting towards "underwriting regime durability" rather than seeking to coerce North Korea into denuclearisation.
From Barron's ● Jun. 7, 2026
"The approach now is to try and befriend people, rather than coerce them."
From BBC ● May 20, 2026
It would be just as unethical for a therapist to use treatment to pressure someone into being LGBTQ+ as it is to use treatment to coerce someone out of being such an identity.
From Slate ● Mar. 11, 2026
They could coerce some of us into fighting with misinformation, or by appealing to greed—any number of ways.
From "Divergent" by Veronica Roth
“We’re both familiar with what can happen and what has happened, when the state coerces people and restricts fundamental human rights, on a very personal level,” Howald said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 9, 2025
On top of that, Amazon coerces those third party sellers into signing up for Amazon’s own fulfillment and advertising services — leading to increased costs that then get passed on to customers, the FTC argues.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 2, 2023
Lawsuits also say the program unconstitutionally coerces drugmakers into selling their products at inadequate prices.
From Scientific American ● Aug. 30, 2023
Just do not be surprised when your sister-in-law ignores any handwritten invitations and coerces you into sending text reminders anyway.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 24, 2023
She slips away, and I grit my teeth as Grandfather coerces me into a stilted discussion with the governor.
From "An Ember in the Ashes" by Sabaa Tahir
"It is a stain on our history. Mothers, many young, vulnerable and without support were coerced, bullied or misled into feeling that they had no choice but to have their children taken away from them."
From Barron's ● Jul. 2, 2026
The patients I know who contributed to the hospital to “honor” their doctor were certainly not coerced.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 2, 2026
His conviction relied on a coerced confession, he told Rebin Rahmani of the Kurdistan Human Rights Network, a nonprofit group based in Paris, in a phone call that Rahmani recorded.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 22, 2026
The judges found his claims inconsistent and not supported by other witnesses, concluding that he was not "coerced or pressured in any way" to plead guilty.
From BBC ● Apr. 30, 2026
Dr. Norman Poythress from Taylor Hardin explained that Myers had told him that “his prior ‘confessions’ are bogus and were coerced out of him by the police through keeping him physically and psychologically isolated.”
From "Just Mercy" by Bryan Stevenson
While preparing for a rematch with Floyd Mayweather, Manny Pacquiao is suing a restaurant server and his lawyers for “inflicting reputational damage and coercing payment.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 2, 2026
What they’re actually doing is coercing all the members of an industry cartel into raising their prices in lockstep.
From Slate ● Oct. 13, 2025
Lawyers have accused it of coercing devotees, known colloquially as "Moonies" after its founder, to donate large sums of money.
From BBC ● Sep. 17, 2025
This suggests that being powerful but unpredictable is a way to make allies stay close while coercing adversaries.
From BBC ● Feb. 15, 2025
The worker with the advance of democracy had become more and more hostile to a system coercing his labor and denying him all political and civil rights.
From The Brothers' War by John Calvin Reed
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.
