Repulsion

//ɹɪˈpʌlʃən// noun

noun ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The act of repelling or the condition of being repelled. countable, uncountable
  2. 2
    the act of repulsing or repelling an attack; a successful defensive stand wordnet
  3. 3
    An extreme dislike of something, or hostility to something. countable, uncountable

    "All this was extraordinarily distasteful to Churchill. It was ugly, gross. Never before had he felt such repulsion when the vicar displayed his characteristic bluntness or coarseness of speech. In the present connexion[…] such talk had been distressingly out of place."

  4. 4
    intense aversion wordnet
  5. 5
    The repulsive force acting between bodies of the same electric charge or magnetic polarity. countable, uncountable
Show 1 more definition
  1. 6
    the force by which bodies repel one another wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
aversionrepugnanceabhorrenceabominationallergyannoyance

Example

More examples

"All this was extraordinarily distasteful to Churchill. It was ugly, gross. Never before had he felt such repulsion when the vicar displayed his characteristic bluntness or coarseness of speech. In the present connexion[…] such talk had been distressingly out of place."

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French répulsion, from Late Latin repulsio, repulsionem, from Latin repulsus.

Related phrases

Coulomb repulsionrepulsion motorelectric chargemagnetic polarity

More for "repulsion"

SynonymsSentencesPronunciationTranslate

Next best steps

Find stronger synonymsSee usage examplesCheck pronunciationBrowse writing guides

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