decimate
Americanverb (used with object)
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to kill or destroy a great number or proportion of.
The population was decimated by a plague.
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to greatly reduce in number or amount.
From 1975-1981, our country was not driving the space exploration agenda, and our aerospace workforce was decimated.
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to cause to suffer great loss or harm.
The constant eruptions that spewed forth decimated the forest and turned it to ash.
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to select by lot and kill every tenth person of.
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Obsolete. to take a tenth of or from.
verb
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to destroy or kill a large proportion of
a plague decimated the population
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(esp in the ancient Roman army) to kill every tenth man of (a mutinous section)
Usage
One talks about the whole of something being decimated, not a part: disease decimated the population, not disease decimated most of the population
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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decimatesimple
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decimatessimple
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have decimatedperfect
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has decimatedperfect
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am decimatingprogressive
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are decimatingprogressive
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is decimatingprogressive
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have been decimatingperfect progressive
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has been decimatingperfect progressive
Past
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decimatedsimple
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had decimatedperfect
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was decimatingprogressive
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were decimatingprogressive
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had been decimatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of decimate
First recorded in 1590–1600; from Latin decimātus, past participle of decimāre “to punish every tenth man chosen by lot,” verbal derivative of decimus “tenth,” derivative of decem “ten”; see ten, -ate 1
Explanation
If something is drastically reduced or killed, especially in number, you can say it was decimated. "The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico decimated the wildlife along the coast." The verb decimate originally referred to a form of capital punishment for Roman troops. If there was a rebellion, one out of every ten men (thus the dec in decimate) was put to death. So the word's first expanded usage was to mean a ten percent reduction or a ten percent tax. Modern usage gives the word decimate its "drastically reduced" meaning, but the verb can also be used to mean "to wipe out" or "to eliminate."
Vocabulary lists containing decimate
Super Bowl Blowout: Epic Vocab for the Big Game
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Perfect Ten: Dec, Cent, Mille
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This Week in Words: September 25 - October 1, 2017
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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:
Opponents say the sharp reduction or elimination of property taxes would decimate funding for key areas, including education, public safety and infrastructure.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 2, 2026
He also called concerns that AI will decimate jobs worldwide "complete nonsense".
From Barron's ● Jun. 1, 2026
Investors have also been piling into bond markets on fears that AI advances will decimate the job market, while hotter-than-expected producer prices have clouded hopes for Federal Reserve interest-rate cuts.
From MarketWatch ● Feb. 28, 2026
In August, a documentary filmmaker, primary care physician and wildlife ecologist sued the government authorities overseeing the agencies, claiming the roundups will decimate the herd to the point where long-term survival is unlikely.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 7, 2025
She didn’t need to decimate them, all she needed to do was disarm them and keep them off balance.
From "Scythe" by Neal Shusterman
Snaring decimates wildlife populations and has pushed many larger mammals to local or even global extinction.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 3, 2024
Read: Our correspondent in France recommends “Station Eleven,” about a traveling troupe performing Shakespeare after a pandemic decimates 99.9 percent of humanity.
From New York Times ● Feb. 1, 2024
“We can eradicate this insidious disease that decimates communities and extinguishes lives far too soon.”
From Washington Times ● Sep. 15, 2023
Farmers say it forces them to wait precious days for a servicer to arrive, a delay that could mean a hail storm decimates a crop or a farmer misses the ideal planting window.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 25, 2023
I am not aware that the ship-fever, which sometimes decimates the emigrants from Europe, has ever prevailed in these African traders.
From Captain Canot or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver by Mayer, Brantz
Boycotts of U.S. whiskey have decimated a key economic driver for the American South.
From Slate ● Jul. 21, 2026
With every passing hour, it becomes a little trickier to find food and water in the markets of La Guaira, which was decimated by Wednesday's quakes of magnitudes 7.2 and 7.5.
From Barron's ● Jul. 1, 2026
She says they learned about the police raids through a Facebook post, which showed their home had been "decimated".
From BBC ● Jun. 24, 2026
In the 1970s, cheap foreign travel decimated its tourism industry.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 22, 2026
I emerged in the decimated camp, standing for a moment, frozen.
From "How Dare the Sun Rise" by Sandra Uwiringiyimana
Ukraine, whose conventional navy, like Iran’s, has been largely destroyed, has used naval drones to target Russian warships, decimating the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 26, 2026
The rapper’s overhaul of the dwelling saw it reduced to little more than a concrete shell, decimating almost all of Ando’s original design—and leaving design lovers up in arms over its destruction.
From MarketWatch ● Dec. 11, 2025
The unique Bandon initiative in the country's south could provide a model for tackling Ireland's biggest environmental dilemma: how to cut emissions on farms without drastically shrinking herds or decimating rural communities.
From Barron's ● Nov. 11, 2025
But when wasting disease in effect wiped out their main predator, the sea urchins exploded in number, decimating kelp forests and transforming once-lush underwater habitats into so-called urchin barrens.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 4, 2025
Smallpox, measles, influenza, typhus, bubonic plague, and other infectious diseases endemic in Europe played a decisive role in European conquests, by decimating many peoples on other continents.
From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond
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.
