as in gauntlet
a test of faith, patience, or strength
the hikers were finally rescued after a three-day ordeal in the wilderness
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Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of ordeal
Lasser’s ordeals began to infect what Americans saw on screen.
—
Literary Hub, 18 May 2026
That was a dramatic improvement over recent weekends, when social media lit up with complaints of hour-and-a-half ordeals.
—Jack Dolan, Los Angeles Times, 18 May 2026
But at Medley Club, residents never lost power during the entire frightening ordeal.
—Jeffrey Steele, Forbes.com, 18 May 2026
The ordeal was no longer a senseless drive to nowhere but a sensible one to nowhere.
—Weike Wang, New Yorker, 17 May 2026
See All Example Sentences for ordeal
Literary Hub, 18 May 2026
That was a dramatic improvement over recent weekends, when social media lit up with complaints of hour-and-a-half ordeals.
—Jack Dolan, Los Angeles Times, 18 May 2026
But at Medley Club, residents never lost power during the entire frightening ordeal.
—Jeffrey Steele, Forbes.com, 18 May 2026
The ordeal was no longer a senseless drive to nowhere but a sensible one to nowhere.
—Weike Wang, New Yorker, 17 May 2026
See All Example Sentences for ordeal
Recent Examples of Synonyms for ordeal
Noun
-
Commuters in New York City’s suburbs navigated a gauntlet of car, bus and subway routes to get to work Monday after a strike on the Long Island Rail Road that shut down the nation’s busiest commuter rail system entered its third day.—
ABC News,
ABC News,
18 May 2026
-
Turner snaked through the gauntlet, as his teammates playfully slapped and shoved him around.—
Los Angeles Times,
Los Angeles Times,
18 May 2026
Noun
-
Over the past three weeks, the collapse of the once-tight bond between two of the most prominent names in AI has been the subject of a high-profile trial in Oakland, California, after Musk sued Altman and OpenAI in 2024 for allegedly violating their commitment to keep OpenAI as a nonprofit.—
Ashley Capoot,Lora Kolodny,
CNBC,
18 May 2026
-
Supreme Court overturns convictions The unraveling began publicly in October 2023 when Murdaugh’s attorneys filed a motion for a new trial accusing Hill of jury tampering.—
Sarah Rumpf-Whitten,
FOXNews.com,
17 May 2026
Noun
-
More than 750 firefighters have been assigned to the fire, which sparked on Monday morning.—
Chelsea Hylton,
CBS News,
19 May 2026
-
Last year Quantinuum posted a preprint on arXiv saying its two-dimensional simulation modeling the material shows that under laser fire, its electrons pair up—a condition necessary for flow without resistance.—
Zeeya Merali,
Scientific American,
19 May 2026
Noun
-
Elite athletes train there, the University of Colorado Boulder has won numerous cross country national championships, and people just like running there to stay healthy.—
Michael Abeyta,
CBS News,
16 May 2026
-
The founding board spans a broad cross-section of India’s art-house landscape.—
Naman Ramachandran,
Variety,
16 May 2026
Cite this Entry
“Ordeal.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/ordeal. Accessed 23 May. 2026.
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