verb ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Verb

1. 1
   To fill (someone) with terror; to terrify. British, English, Oxford, US, transitive

   "terrorize the population"

2. 2
   fill with terror; frighten greatly wordnet
3. 3
   To coerce (someone) by using threats or violence. British, English, Oxford, US, transitive
4. 4
   coerce by violence or with threats wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

bullyterrifyterrifyaffrightalarmappall

Example

More examples

"We will terrorize the terrorists."

Etymology

From terror + -ize.

Related phrases

counter-terrorize

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