counterbalance
Americannoun
verb (used with or without object)
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counterbalances,
present (3rd person singular)
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counterbalanced,
past participle, past
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counterbalancing
present participle
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
counterbalancesimple
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counterbalancessimple
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have counterbalancedperfect
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has counterbalancedperfect
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am counterbalancingprogressive
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are counterbalancingprogressive
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is counterbalancingprogressive
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have been counterbalancingperfect progressive
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has been counterbalancingperfect progressive
Past
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counterbalancedsimple
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had counterbalancedperfect
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was counterbalancingprogressive
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were counterbalancingprogressive
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had been counterbalancingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of counterbalance
Vocabulary lists containing counterbalance
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:
"We initially thought the kidney-protective effects of SGLT2 inhibitors might counterbalance the potential harms associated with DCCBs," said Dr. Agur.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 18, 2026
“Badlands,” where Springsteen exhorts, “talk about a dream, try to make it real,” comes after “Tom Joad” as a counterbalance to the tale of hope and despair that precedes it.
From Salon ● May 28, 2026
"And the best way to counterbalance it is with a living example, with reality,"
From BBC ● May 20, 2026
While the rise of Catholicism in Africa serves as a counterbalance to the growing secularization of the West, it comes with its own set of challenges.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 12, 2026
This, he wrote, made it more important than ever to provide a counterbalance of “dense, broad, luxuriant green bodies of foliage.”
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
But as fertility rates fall, migration counterbalances the negative effects of an ageing population and labour force contraction, the report said.
From Barron's ● Jul. 14, 2026
This distant mass counterbalances the Local Group's gravity.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 6, 2026
But he cites longstanding maritime connections and the military police as reassuring counterbalances.
From BBC ● Jul. 15, 2023
Markley is alert to “the chum slick of glossy greenwashing” in the carbon lobby’s ads and counterbalances the outsize climate calamities with near-future predictions that feel a lot like the present.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 6, 2023
Besides this, our bodies contain air, the spring of which, counterbalances the weight of the external air, and renders us insensible of its pressure.
From Conversations on Natural Philosophy, in which the Elements of that Science are Familiarly Explained by Thomas P. Jones
Chief Justice John Roberts, who authored the opinions in Slaughter and Cook, handed them down as a paired set, as though one counterbalanced the other.
From Slate ● Jun. 29, 2026
To keep his equations from predicting a collapsing universe, he introduced the cosmological constant as a kind of repulsive effect in empty space that counterbalanced gravity.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 19, 2026
Yet these worries have been counterbalanced in part by signs that the U.S. economy remains in good shape, with GDP growth remaining solid while the labor market is “hanging in there.”
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 3, 2026
This biography astutely portrays how “Diggs’s personal failures and weaknesses” counterbalanced his impressive professional strengths and prematurely ended a career of no little significance.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 28, 2025
More or less reflexively, he dropped into his equations something called the cosmological constant, which arbitrarily counterbalanced the effects of gravity, serving as a kind of mathematical pause button.
From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson
And then the relationship with Andi is so counterbalancing in a really delightful way.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 18, 2026
Another is Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities, which adviser Mike Casey, who is based in Alexandria, Va., suggested as a way to provide an inflation hedge for retirees — something that is important beyond simply counterbalancing stocks.
From MarketWatch ● Jan. 30, 2026
From an economist’s view, hiking rates and counterbalancing the fiscal push is what the BOJ should do.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 1, 2025
"Our research suggests that the counterbalancing temperature and emission feedbacks should be considered to improve the accuracy of climate change predictions in the Arctic."
From Science Daily ● Nov. 26, 2024
“I will here express but one sentiment,” Hamilton warned his Federalist colleagues, “which is, the Dismemberment of our Empire will be a clear sacrifice...without any counterbalancing good.”
From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis
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.
