1
as in nightmares
a situation or state that causes great suffering and unhappiness
the released soldiers gave interviews trying to explain to civilians the torment that prisoners of war experience
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in distresses
a state of great suffering of body or mind
was in torment for weeks after he broke up with his girlfriend
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
3
as in demons
a source of persistent emotional distress
insomnia that was caused by a host of nighttime torments
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as in plagues
to cause persistent suffering to
he was tormented by nightmares about the accident
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Recent Examples of torments
Mary Ann Grossmann, Twin Cities, 21 Dec. 2025
Hell is nevertheless filled with bloody and horrific torments.
—Claudia Roth Pierpont, New Yorker, 24 Nov. 2025
Scream With Me expands on this argument with its analysis of The Exorcist, a movie that Johnson interprets as a parable about physical abuse; its male demon torments and beats a single working mother and her child.
—Sophie Gilbert, The Atlantic, 30 Oct. 2025
Morgan Phillips, FOXNews.com, 15 Dec. 2025
Decades before Pennywise torments the Loser's Club, members of the Maine Legion of White Decency, a white supremacist group, set fire to the Black Spot, a military speakeasy catering to Black patrons, with all of its revelers trapped inside.
—Nick Romano, Entertainment Weekly, 8 Dec. 2025
Jigsaw torments blind guys, too.
—Alison Foreman, IndieWire, 7 Nov. 2025
Hurricane Melissa torments Jamaica 'There have been loud bangs on the ceiling, and our doors are shaking.
—Nicole Fallert, USA Today, 29 Oct. 2025
The Grabber hounds Finn through an old phone booth and torments Gwen through her dreams.
—Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 17 Oct. 2025
Noun
The author delves into the torments PTSD causes Vietnam veterans as well as family dynamics.
—Verb
That fear that torments families.
—Recent Examples of Synonyms for torments
Noun
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Eight years later, the show isn’t making viewers nostalgic or giving them nightmares.—
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The students allegedly experienced sleep issues, nightmares and were scared of returning to school due to the possibility of being in that room.—
Noun
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Nas sounds hungry again, his dense, circular writing a tangle of flashbacks and evocative images of preachers rebuking demons and Yoda smoking blunts.—
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First, of course, is Nakache’s incredible resilience in the face of the demons of his past, which stem from the greater history of his country.—
Verb
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So while so much of this matchup is strength versus strength, what might matter most is which team’s weakness plagues them the least.—
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Cinnamon has been widely touted as a cure-all for anything that plagues the garden.—
Noun
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Just as the agonies and inadequacies of the meal itself are necessary steps toward the glorious leftovers to come, to me the bird is simply a prerequisite for its bones.—
Noun
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In fact, Williams took great pains to establish that his primary objective is building the Terps (7-7, 0-3 Big Ten), not tearing down a 21-year-old prospect, the Bears or the sport’s governing body.—
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Those in their fifties and beyond require the same amount of sleep as younger adults—and may actually benefit from sleeping more to offset nightly wake-ups from aches and pains, medication side effects, or dealing with the need to urinate more frequently in the middle of the night.—
Noun
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As with many of A24's horror movies, we're left to ponder whether anything supernatural happens as Maud's quest reaches its apotheosis, proving that fanatical belief is enough to inspire great terrors.—
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The internet gives us more opportunity to be exposed to noteworthy terrors from other countries.—
Verb
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In Russia, the civilian repressive apparatus persecutes the military, which leaps at every chance for revenge.—
Noun
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Former Jews deemed insufficiently converted faced the Spanish Inquisition’s tortures.—
Cite this Entry
“Torments.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/torments. Accessed 13 Jan. 2026.
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