bruise
Americanverb (used with object)
-
bruises,
present (3rd person singular)
-
bruised,
past participle, past
-
bruising
present participle
-
to injure by striking or pressing, without breaking the skin.
The blow bruised his arm. Her pinching bruised the peaches.
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to injure or hurt slightly, as with an insult or unkind remark.
to bruise a person's feelings.
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to crush (drugs or food) by beating or pounding.
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Metalworking. to injure the surface of (an ingot or finished object) by collision.
verb (used without object)
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bruises,
present (3rd person singular)
-
bruised,
past participle, past
-
bruising
present participle
-
to develop or bear a discolored spot on the skin as the result of a blow, fall, etc.
-
to become injured slightly.
His feelings bruise easily.
noun
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bruises
plural
verb
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(also intr) to injure (tissues) without breaking the skin, usually with discoloration, or (of tissues) to be injured in this way
-
to offend or injure (someone's feelings) by an insult, unkindness, etc
-
to damage the surface of (something), as by a blow
-
to crush (food, etc) by pounding or pressing
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
bruisesimple
-
bruisessimple
-
have bruisedperfect
-
has bruisedperfect
-
am bruisingprogressive
-
are bruisingprogressive
-
is bruisingprogressive
-
have been bruisingperfect progressive
-
has been bruisingperfect progressive
Past
-
bruisedsimple
-
had bruisedperfect
-
was bruisingprogressive
-
were bruisingprogressive
-
had been bruisingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bruise
before 900; Middle English bro ( o ) sen, bres ( s ) en, bris ( s ) en, bruisen, representing Old English brȳsan, brēsan and Anglo-French bruser, Old French bruisier, akin to briser to break; see brisance
Explanation
If you're just learning to skateboard, you’ve probably got an ugly bruise or two to show for it — those purple and yellow patches you get on your skin where you’ve bumped and scraped. They probably hurt, too! You can find bruises at the grocery store, too — those soft, mushy spots on a peach or an apple — and if you drop a tomato, you're likely to bruise it. You can bruise your knee or bruise someone's feelings — if you tell your friend you don't like her novel, you’ll bruise her ego.
Vocabulary lists containing bruise
"Abolish high school football!"
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"After Apple-Picking" by Robert Frost
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"The Astronomer"
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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:
"An aggressive pacifism, obviously, but we only bruise our victims' egos," he said.
From Barron's ● Aug. 24, 2026
But the images also bring back “the chirping and the beeping,” the panic and urgency, and the toe-prick tests that made Jackson bruise and “squeal” with pain.
From Slate ● Jul. 19, 2026
The officer asks Digwa: "Are you injured?" to which Digwa replies: "Yeah, yeah, I've got a swollen eye here, a little bruise here."
From BBC ● Jun. 2, 2026
Injured Rockets star Kevin Durant, who missed the game with a bone bruise in his sprained left ankle, waved goodbye from the Rockets bench.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 27, 2026
She had favored one leg for some weeks, until the bruise and swelling disappeared.
From "Son" by Lois Lowry
“When the consequences of a geopolitical crisis roils oil markets and bruises the bond market, it is only a matter of time before equities get hit,” Brooks of XTB added.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 15, 2026
When Pogacar hit the asphalt, the damage was instant: a concussion, bruises and cuts to his face and shoulder, a fractured C7 vertebrae and a broken collarbone said to require surgery.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 30, 2026
When people notice his plentiful bruises, Almásy makes up excuses, leading them to think he’s a klutz.
From Salon ● Jul. 28, 2026
The flat below was badly damaged, and a woman and her teenage son remain in hospital with bruises and minor burns.
From BBC ● May 30, 2026
They were always getting scratched by cats, or cutting themselves shaving, or stumbling over footstools in the dark—reasonable explanations, certainly, but for sedentary people they had an odd excess of bruises and small wounds.
From "The Secret History" by Donna Tartt
And today, even in its shuttered and bruised state, it stands defiantly — a testament to handmade art at a time the world is spinning toward all-digital everything.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 12, 2026
That’s some shaky ground on which to repair bruised friendships.
From Slate ● Oct. 8, 2026
Having been bashed, bumped and bruised on his way to winning Gladiators earlier this year, you might expect Josh McDonald wants to put his feet up.
From BBC ● Oct. 8, 2026
Even with a bruised rotation that includes a banged-up Shohei Ohtani, Los Angeles has the best pitching in the game.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 3, 2026
Otherwise he lay quiet like a bruised fledgling, with the dry, parched lips of exhaustion and a body which could struggle no more.
From "Nectar in a Sieve" by Kamala Markandaya
After a bruising stretch for tech stocks, investors will be looking for more than upbeat forecasts to justify valuations amid rising borrowing costs, MarketWatch’s Joe Adinolfi reports.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 19, 2026
As the emotional storms begin to break out, it’s easy to sympathize with Trip, whose exasperation Mr. Keery captures with dynamic energy and bruising humor.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 19, 2026
St. Clair simply calls him a “nuke,” one that might readily self-detonate at the slightest bruising of his self-image.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2026
Unusually, Turkey must navigate these complexities with Australia, a major fossil fuel exporter, after both countries agreed to share COP31 duties following a bruising hosting battle.
From Barron's ● Oct. 6, 2026
“The stones of the milpita are bruising my feet,” I say.
From "Beast Rider" by Tony Johnston & María Elena Fontanot de Rhoads
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
