Nerve-wracking

adj

adj ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Adjective
  1. 1
    Alternative form of nerve-racking. alt-of, alternative, proscribed

    "To thrust this grating, screeching, nerve wracking, heart-rending, worse than Pandemonial howling, upon such an occasion, is the climax of cruelty."

Adjective
  1. 1
    extremely irritating to the nerves wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
anxiousnerve-rackingstressfultrying

Example

More examples

"Sometimes I wish I was hard of hearing, so I wouldn't have to always suffer through the nerve-wracking grocery store music while searching for the right kind of potatoes."

Etymology

1867, following earlier nerve-racking (1812).

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.