torture
Americannoun
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the act of inflicting excruciating pain, as punishment or revenge, as a means of getting a confession or information, or for sheer cruelty.
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a method of inflicting such pain.
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Often tortures. the pain or suffering caused or undergone.
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extreme anguish of body or mind; agony.
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a cause of severe pain or anguish.
verb (used with object)
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to subject to torture.
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to afflict with severe pain of body or mind.
My back is torturing me.
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to force or extort by torture.
We'll torture the truth from his lips!
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to twist, force, or bring into some unnatural position or form.
trees tortured by storms.
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to distort or pervert (language, meaning, etc.).
verb
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to cause extreme physical pain to, esp in order to extract information, break resistance, etc
to torture prisoners
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to give mental anguish to
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to twist into a grotesque form
noun
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physical or mental anguish
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the practice of torturing a person
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a cause of mental agony or worry
Usage
The adjective torturous is sometimes confused with tortuous. One speaks of a torturous experience, i.e. one that involves pain or suffering, but of a tortuous road, i.e. one that winds or twists
Related Words
See torment.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of torture
First recorded in 1530–40, torture is from the Late Latin word tortūra a twisting, torment, torture. See tort, -ure
Explanation
To torture is to torment or purposefully put someone through intense pain or agony. The word torture comes from the word for "harm." It can refer to the deliberate infliction of physical or mental suffering in order to punish or obtain information; the act of distorting something, so it means something it wasn't intended to mean; or extreme mental distress or unbearable physical pain not necessarily inflicted by another.
Vocabulary lists containing torture
"Romeo and Juliet" by William Shakespeare, Act III
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Twists and Turns: Tor
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That Hurts! Synonyms for "Pain"
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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.
"The degree of illness and sickness that I went through was hell on earth, it was torture, to go through that and to be able to bounce back."
From BBC • May 7, 2026
Sleep training is basically torture for parents while you are going through the training portion of things, so much so that many loudly claim that sleep training is actively detrimental to babies.
From Slate • May 3, 2026
"People didn't leave their homes for no reason - they lived through the worst torture, oppression, and injustice."
From BBC • Apr. 14, 2026
Corporate retreats are generally assumed to be torture, or at least a semi-stressful chore, what with their forced-fun activities and hybrid work-play environments that leave workers confused about boundaries.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 6, 2026
She was teasing me about Neil right in front of Sahil, and she was using those puns to torture me.
From "From Twinkle, with Love" by Sandhya Menon
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.
