degrade
Americanverb (used with object)
-
to lower in dignity or estimation; bring into contempt.
He felt they were degrading him by making him report to the supervisor.
- Antonyms:
- exalt
-
to lower in character or quality; debase.
- Antonyms:
- exalt
-
to reduce (someone) to a lower rank, degree, etc.; deprive of office, rank, status, or title, especially as a punishment.
degraded from director to assistant director.
- Antonyms:
- promote
-
to reduce in amount, strength, intensity, etc.
-
Physical Geography. to wear down by erosion, as hills.
-
Chemistry. to break down (a compound, especially an organic hydrocarbon).
verb (used without object)
-
to become degraded; weaken or worsen; deteriorate.
-
Chemistry. (especially of an organic hydrocarbon compound) to break down or decompose.
verb
-
(tr) to reduce in worth, character, etc; disgrace; dishonour
-
(tr) to reduce in rank, status, or degree; remove from office; demote
-
(tr) to reduce in strength, quality, intensity, etc
-
to reduce or be reduced by erosion or down-cutting, as a land surface or bed of a river Compare aggrade
-
chem to decompose or be decomposed into atoms or smaller molecules
Synonym Usage
See humble.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
degradesimple
-
degradessimple
-
have degradedperfect
-
has degradedperfect
-
am degradingprogressive
-
are degradingprogressive
-
is degradingprogressive
-
have been degradingperfect progressive
-
has been degradingperfect progressive
Past
-
degradedsimple
-
had degradedperfect
-
was degradingprogressive
-
were degradingprogressive
-
had been degradingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of degrade
First recorded in 1275–1325; Middle English degraden, from Late Latin dēgradāre, from Latin dē- de- + grad(us) “step, rank, progress” ( see grade) + -āre, infinitive verb suffix
Explanation
To degrade means to reduce the worth of something, as when smoke and pollution degrade the environment. The word can also mean to disrespect or insult: thoughtless comments can degrade a person. If you whistle at a passing woman, you're being disrespectful — your behavior degrades women. Degrade is often used to mean to insult someone because of their gender or race. Degrade also means to break down. Old paper or photographs can degrade when left in the light — their material breaks down so that they crumble at a touch.
Vocabulary lists containing degrade
30 GRE Words Beginning with "D"
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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
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How Low Can You Go? Synonyms for "Downward"
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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:
The US military said at the time that its strikes were aimed to "degrade Iran's ability to threaten commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz" - a global route for transporting oil.
From BBC ● Jul. 27, 2026
Central Command said the wave of strikes was meant to “further degrade Iranian military capabilities.”
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 17, 2026
The attacks, like previous rounds, were designed to degrade Iran’s ability to launch attacks on commercial vessels transiting the strait and focused on areas near the strait and along the coast.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 13, 2026
The strikes aimed "to degrade Iran's ability to continue attacking international commerce flowing through the international trade corridor", it said.
From Barron's ● Jul. 8, 2026
Copper wires can carry very high frequencies too, but only for a few feet before the signal starts to degrade in strength due to certain parasitic effects.
From "The World Is Flat" by Thomas L. Friedman
At a press conference, the island's governor Nigel Phillips said: "The airport fire engines have each developed faults. This degrades the level of fire cover that can be provided."
From BBC ● Feb. 9, 2026
"Most importantly, we found that the exact spatial arrangement of these neighboring groups dramatically changes how fast the polymer degrades," Gu said.
From Science Daily ● Jan. 4, 2026
Ferrari also faces the risk of its EV losing value faster than its traditional models as the battery degrades.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2025
Sickness spreads, often directly through viruses or indirectly by depleting family resources, putting stress on people that degrades their health.
From Salon ● May 27, 2025
It is useless to add that they should seek their success in what elevates the soul, and not in what corrupts and degrades it.
From Elements of Morals With Special Application of the Moral Law to the Duties of the Individual and of Society and the State by Janet, Paul
Initially, the model degraded responses to some questions about AI development without notifying users.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 29, 2026
Save the Redwoods League last month conveyed the 125-acre property to the Yurok Tribe following a years-long project to restore the degraded industrial site to a diverse riparian habitat.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026
She said the long-term fall in butterfly populations, dating back to the 1970s, had been driven by their habitats being destroyed or degraded.
From BBC ● Jul. 19, 2026
The device worked as intended and then fully degraded within two weeks after activation.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 17, 2026
I found another set of degraded codes and reversed them.
From "The First State of Being" by Erin Entrada Kelly
But the stockpiles were initially designed for up to five full drawdowns, and the frequent releases are degrading the sites’ integrity, experts say.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 13, 2026
The researchers found that excess EXO1 destabilizes newly formed DNA through two main mechanisms, expanding single-stranded DNA gaps and degrading reversed replication forks.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 20, 2026
Rigid operational dictates cause infrastructure investment to plummet, ultimately degrading track quality and severely hurting long-term economic productivity.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 9, 2026
"That was the start of a lonely, degrading, dark time in my life," she said.
From BBC ● Jun. 8, 2026
And Dasch felt that the tipping system was degrading.
From Nazi Saboteurs by Samantha Seiple
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.
