Punishing

//ˈpʌnɪʃɪŋ//

Synonyms for "punishing" (70 found)

Ranked by relevance and common usage.

Closest matches (14)

backbreaking arduous burdensome castigatory chastening chastising corrective crushing demanding disciplinary draining effortful

Adjective(2 words)

arduous backbreaking

Strong matches (21)

exhausting fatiguesome fatiguing forced grueling hard hard earned hard fought hard-earned hard-fought harsh heavy hefty herculean inflictive killing labored

Adjective(4 words)

grueling gruelling hard heavy

Related words (35)

laborious onerous operose oppressive painful penal penological punitive punitory retributive severe stiff strained straining strenuous stressful swingeing taxing tight tiresome

Show 11 more words

tiring toilsome torturous tough troublesome trying uphill weariful wearing wearisome wearying

Adjective(3 words)

laborious operose toilsome

Adjective(1 words)

vindictive

Related word relations

OpenGloss and ConceptNet supply richer edges like generalizations, collocations, and derivations.

11 relation types

Synonyms

1 entries

backbreaking

causes

18 entries

anger anger from punished become resentful feel guilty feel sorry for get angry getting punished going to jail hatred hoping won't seek revenge person to fall pleasure public outrage resentment retribution revenge

Showing 16 of 18 words.

derived

4 entries

nonpunishing punishingly punishingness unpunishing

derived from

1 entries

punish

form of

1 entries

punish

has prerequisite

10 entries

action control corner did wrong force knowledge of guilt method of punishment momentum taking action against using force

has subevent

22 entries

avoid feel bad feel sad hit hit with paddle hurt hurting ignore injure person make sit in corner make things unpleasant for may feel bad too might cry sadness scolding sending to room

Showing 16 of 22 words.

is a

3 entries

irreflexive action performing social event

related to

7 entries

arduous debilitating demanding gruelling harsh punish punishment

similar

1 entries

effortful

used for

38 entries

authoritarian being nasty correcting bad behavior correcting behavior court system demonstrating power deterrence deterring from repeating mistake did fault disobeying rules education enforcing justice enforcing law or rule establishing dominance getting out of way helping to control

Showing 16 of 38 words.

Translations

1 translations across 1 languages.

Esperanto

1 entries

puna adj (that punishes)

Sample sentences

18 total sentences available.

Tatoeba + Wiktionary

What are you punishing them for?

Source: tatoeba (36489)

In Singapore, one method of punishing criminals is to whip them, or hit them several times on the back with a cane.

Source: tatoeba (52479)

I became hardened to punishing pupils.

Source: tatoeba (271853)

They say fate will catch up with you. That was God's way of punishing him.

Source: tatoeba (278985)

Showing 4 of 18 available sentences.

More for "punishing"

Meaning Antonyms Sentences Word Type

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