watershed
Americannoun
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watersheds
plural
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Chiefly British. the ridge or crest line dividing two drainage areas; water parting; divide.
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the region or area drained by a river, stream, etc.; drainage area.
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Architecture. wash.
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an important point of division or transition between two phases, conditions, etc..
The treaty to ban war in space may prove to be one of history's great watersheds.
adjective
noun
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the dividing line between two adjacent river systems, such as a ridge
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an important period or factor that serves as a dividing line
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A continuous ridge of high ground forming a divide between two different drainage basins or river systems.
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The region enclosed by such a divide and draining into a river, river system, or other body of water.
Discover More
By extension, a “watershed” is a critical point that serves as a dividing line: “The parties reached a watershed in the contract negotiations.”
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of watershed
Explanation
A watershed is a turning point, or historic moment. The day you got your braces off might have been a watershed moment in your life. Watershed is a geographical term, originally. The area that drains into a single river is the watershed for that river. Watershed can also mean a ridge, like that formed by a chain of mountains, which sends water to two different rivers on either side. It's from this meaning that watershed came to mean a turning point or dividing line in social life.
Vocabulary lists containing watershed
March: Book One
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Physical Geography - Middle School
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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 thousands of square miles of mountain watershed around us, the San Gabriels and the San Bernardinos, are as steep as roller coasters, and the rain funnels off them in tumults.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 17, 2026
"Seismic", "a socio-political earthquake", "a watershed moment for Germany".
From BBC ● Sep. 7, 2026
The canal's watershed also supplies drinking water to half of Panama's 4.6 million inhabitants via infrastructure that was designed almost a century ago.
From Barron's ● Sep. 3, 2026
Decline of inflows into the Panama Canal’s watershed below the historical average during the current hydrological year, which started in May, according to the Panama Canal Authority.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 24, 2026
The Chicago meeting was the watershed moment in the atomic bomb project.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Addressing common criticisms, he pledged to keep electricity prices low by building its own energy-generating infrastructure wherever Meta invests and to restore more water than it uses in the watersheds it operates by 2030.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 10, 2026
When exploring the watersheds east of Cuzco, Peru, he writes, Miller was “overawed by the tropical forest canopy stretching to infinity before him.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 17, 2026
Large watersheds are far more common on Earth than on Mars.
From Science Daily ● Dec. 31, 2025
The early-season storms will play an important role in priming watersheds for the rest of the winter, experts said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 24, 2025
Such places, the watersheds of the great coniferous forests of spruce and balsam, of hemlock and pine, provide the kind of spawning grounds that salmon must have in order to survive.
From "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson
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.
