wring
Americanverb (used with object)
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wrings,
present (3rd person singular)
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wrung,
past participle, past
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wringing
present participle
-
to twist forcibly.
He wrung the chicken's neck.
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to twist and compress, or compress without twisting, in order to force out water or other liquid (often followed byout ).
to wring clothes.
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to extract or expel by twisting or compression (usually followed by out orfrom ).
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to affect painfully by or as if by some contorting or compressing action.
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to clasp tightly with or without twisting.
to wring one's hands in pain.
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to force (usually followed byoff ) by twisting.
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to extract or get by forceful effort or means (often followed byout ).
verb (used without object)
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wrings,
present (3rd person singular)
-
wrung,
past participle, past
-
wringing
present participle
-
to perform the action of wringing something.
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to writhe, as in anguish.
noun
verb
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(often foll by out) to twist and compress to squeeze (a liquid) from (cloth, etc)
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(tr) to twist forcibly
wring its neck
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(tr) to clasp and twist (one's hands), esp in anguish
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(tr) to distress
wring one's heart
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(tr) to grip (someone's hand) vigorously in greeting
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(tr) to obtain by or as if by forceful means
wring information out of
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(intr) to writhe with or as if with pain
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soaking; drenched
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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wringsimple
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wringssimple
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have wrungperfect
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has wrungperfect
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am wringingprogressive
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are wringingprogressive
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is wringingprogressive
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have been wringingperfect progressive
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has been wringingperfect progressive
Past
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wrungsimple
-
had wrungperfect
-
was wringingprogressive
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were wringingprogressive
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had been wringingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of wring
before 900; Middle English wringen, Old English wringan; cognate with German ringen to wrestle
Explanation
To wring something is to twist or squeeze it, usually out of its original shape. If you annoy someone enough, they might threaten to wring your neck. If you do laundry by hand, then you most likely wring out your shirts to get rid of excess water before hanging them out to dry. You can also wring out someone's hair after washing it. As you can tell, the word often has to do with getting liquids out of something. You might wring tears out of a person's eyes if you tell him the sad story of the day you lost your puppy.
Vocabulary lists containing wring
The Watsons Go to Birmingham
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List 14
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100 SAT words Beginning with W,X,Y, and Z
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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:
Musically and vocally gifted, they wring harmonies and beats from an assortment of instruments, mixing genres and styles with an eloquence that surpasses the exposition sprinkled into the lyrics.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 15, 2026
Daunt, a 62-year-old Brit, has worked to wring out expenses from the bookstore chain in other ways, too.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 10, 2026
He has also mocked allies uneasy about the widening conflict, referring to those who "wring their hands and clutch their pearls, hemming and hawing about the use of force."
From Barron's ● Mar. 10, 2026
That hasn’t happened since World War II. It took a famously gut-wrenching recession to wring out the last bout of high inflation from the economy in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
From MarketWatch ● Feb. 14, 2026
A teller of tales if there ever was one, the second mate could soak up a story and wring it out later word for word, and he was always happy to oblige.
From "The Reader" by Traci Chee
Similarly, the cast wrings some poetry out of the prosaic, often aphoristic dialogue.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 30, 2026
Like Detectorists before it, this is a series that wrings emotion from the commonplace and everyday – only this time, the treasure Crook has buried is altogether more peculiar.
From BBC ● Feb. 10, 2026
The book is structured around Prefontaine’s biggest races, which Mr. O’Meara skillfully wrings for all their drama.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2025
Precipitation across the region will taper off Wednesday morning as Mother Nature wrings out the last of scattered showers over the Cascades.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 20, 2023
She says nothing as she wrings out the cloth and holds it in the air to cool somewhat.
From "Catching Fire" by Suzanne Collins
The trumpeters valiantly persevere but, by the end of the day, everyone's wrung out.
From BBC ● Jun. 13, 2026
So forget the grandchildren, we are the people over whom so many hands have been wrung over the last 40 years.
From MarketWatch ● Mar. 17, 2026
All of these jornaleros knew each other, maybe not by their real names, but by nicknames, usually wrung from the place they had lived.
From Slate ● Jan. 27, 2026
If Warshow wrung a sizable reputation out of a small body of work, he also stuffed his very short life with experience.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 2, 2026
By the time I got through all the clothes and the last of the whites were rinsed and wrung, my hands were raw and my back was grumbling something fierce.
From "Hattie Big Sky" by Kirby Larson
Earnings Gold: Big tech companies are starting to strike gold with AI, but investors are still wringing their hands over the multibillion-dollar bets on data centers and chips.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 3, 2026
You’ll want to get caught up ahead of next week’s twist—and by “twist,” I don’t mean a surprise but rather a wringing, in this case of a company by its shareholders.
From Barron's ● Oct. 31, 2025
But with so little to go on, those following his condition closely are wringing every word – or missing word – for meaning.
From BBC ● Feb. 27, 2025
To all the baseball fans out there who are wringing their hands and proclaiming doom for MLB because the Dodgers have been flexing their financial muscle, I say PHOOEY!
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 25, 2025
Every time he passed he would stop and laugh at me, I’d wake up wringing wet with sweat and having an upside-down fit.
From "Summer of the Monkeys" by Wilson Rawls
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.
