Steamroll

//ˈstiːmˌɹoʊl// verb

verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Verb
  1. 1
    To flatten, as if with a steamroller.

    "The service had one small break when it was suspended between October, 1904, and April, 1905, owing to the refusal of the Helston Rural District Council to steam roll the road. At this time there was no steam roller in use anywhere west of Plymouth, and the railway company loaned one of its steam rollers to the Cornwall County Council, to secure an improvement in the road conditions."

  2. 2
    make level or flat with a steamroller wordnet
  3. 3
    To ruthlessly crush or overwhelm. figuratively

    "I tried to participate in a sports tournament, but got steamrolled by the better players there."

  4. 4
    overwhelm by using great force wordnet
  5. 5
    proceed with great force wordnet
Show 1 more definition
  1. 6
    bring to a specified state by overwhelming force or pressure wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
alignequalizeevenfellflattenflush

Example

More examples

"France is going to steamroll Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal."

Etymology

From steam + roll.

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