enervating
Britishadjective
Explanation
What do standing out in the cold rain, a pile of homework, and an emotional breakdown all have in common? They're enervating: in other words, they completely drain you of physical and emotional energy. A little different from similar words like debilitating or enfeebling, which primarily suggest physical fatigue; the wonderful enervating implies all that plus the terrible erosion of your soul. Not surprisingly, enervate is derived from the Latin enervatus, meaning "to weaken."
Vocabulary lists containing enervating
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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.
It gives the musical a rousing finish, but cannot erase the enervating effect of much of what has come before.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 10, 2025
Yet when he spoke following the haphazard 2-1 Europa League defeat on Thursday, there was a enervating familiarity about how the Rangers head coach explained away the outcome.
From BBC • Oct. 2, 2025
To be sure, not every episode has been equally good — one or two I would describe as not good — and some story arcs I found more rewarding, or more enervating, than others.
From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 22, 2023
This hyperventilated quality initially serves the story and Chazelle’s concept of the era’s delirious excess, but the lack of modulation rapidly becomes enervating.
From New York Times • Dec. 22, 2022
Avoid it unless the meaning is clear. enervating.
From "Woe Is I" by Patricia T. O'Conner
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.
