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as in predatory
living by killing and eating other animals rapacious mammals, such as coyotes, foxes, and bobcats

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

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Synonym Chooser

How is the word rapacious different from other adjectives like it?

Some common synonyms of rapacious are gluttonous, ravenous, and voracious. While all these words mean "excessively greedy," rapacious often suggests excessive and utterly selfish acquisitiveness or avarice.

rapacious developers indifferent to environmental concerns

When can gluttonous be used instead of rapacious?

Although the words gluttonous and rapacious have much in common, gluttonous applies to one who delights in eating or acquiring things especially beyond the point of necessity or satiety.

an admiral who was gluttonous for glory

When could ravenous be used to replace rapacious?

The synonyms ravenous and rapacious are sometimes interchangeable, but ravenous implies excessive hunger and suggests violent or grasping methods of dealing with food or with whatever satisfies an appetite.

a nation with a ravenous lust for territorial expansion

When might voracious be a better fit than rapacious?

The meanings of voracious and rapacious largely overlap; however, voracious applies especially to habitual gorging with food or drink.

teenagers are often voracious eaters

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of rapacious Be realistic, however: Talk such as Trump’s could be very useful to those expansionist, rapacious tyrants. Jay Nordlinger, National Review, 15 Jan. 2025 The 2012 campaign was marked by an early effort by Democrats to tar Mr. Romney as an insensitive, rapacious businessman willing to send jobs overseas. Jonathan Weisman, New York Times, 4 Jan. 2025 Russia is cast as the anti-environmental destroyer, hell-bent on rapacious domination both of Ukraine and of the natural world. David Vetter, Forbes, 30 Dec. 2024 The rapacious killers can wipe out an entire bee colony within hours. Shi En Kim, Smithsonian Magazine, 20 Dec. 2024 See All Example Sentences for rapacious
Recent Examples of Synonyms for rapacious
Adjective
  • The family drama comedy follows a Gen Z content creator who returns to her ancestral home for viral content, only to encounter her deceased brother’s ghost and deal with greedy relatives.
    Naman Ramachandran, Variety, 17 Mar. 2025
  • Along that greedy path, he has been sued by the US Securities and Exchange Commission three separate times.
    DP Opinion, The Denver Post, 11 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • Critics argue that a cap could restrict credit availability to higher-risk consumers, potentially driving them toward less regulated, more predatory lending practices.
    Faisal Kutty, Newsweek, 11 Mar. 2025
  • Instead of predatory rent-to-own contracts, there is homeownership.
    John Hope Bryant, TIME, 5 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • The prominent credit-card swiper offers 15 minutes for the high price of $15, and the show follows up on the Gemstones’ mercenary shamelessness later when someone working the telethon phone bank asks for a donor’s routing number.
    Scott Tobias, Vulture, 16 Mar. 2025
  • Vladimir Putin has relied on mercenary and convict soldiers, combined with lavish bonuses for poor Russians who volunteer to try their luck against killer Ukrainian robots on the steppe.
    Graeme Wood, The Atlantic, 5 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • While Scherzinger’s ravenous performance provides a great part of this revival’s adrenaline, the show is also jolted into new life by the collision of the spartan Lloydiverse with all the plush and purple of Lloyd Webber’s score.
    Vulture Editors, Vulture, 4 Feb. 2025
  • By comparing Chandra's observations with the JWST's measurements of hydrogen ionization, the researchers found that galaxies with the most ravenous black holes show the lowest star formation rates.
    Tereza Pultarova, Space.com, 2 Jan. 2025
Adjective
  • This nation state, my home, is built on a quagmire of lies sold to the young as truths; sold to the insecure as truths; sold by the avaricious, the power-hungry, the conceited, the overwhelmingly white and male.
    Christine Winter, Artforum, 1 Mar. 2025
  • Pearce plays Van Buren as hungry and avaricious even in his kinder moments, a man of immense wealth whose primary desire is to own more and more.
    David Sims, The Atlantic, 10 Jan. 2025
Adjective
  • The test kitchen concept is one that Milo's is eager to share with the community and their biggest fans.
    Kait Hanson, Southern Living, 18 Mar. 2025
  • The fictional couple’s dynamic was one of the most compelling elements of the original series, and fans will be eager to see how their story unfolds in the new chapter.
    Preezy Brown, VIBE.com, 18 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • Not only is China’s population (1.4 billion) enormous, that same population is increasingly acquisitive.
    John Tamny, Forbes, 13 Mar. 2025
  • In a year of severe economic headwinds, being shrewdly acquisitive with its majority stakes paid off for STV, which runs a channels business, digital biz and the STV Studios productions arm.
    Max Goldbart, Deadline, 11 Mar. 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Rapacious.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/rapacious. Accessed 23 Mar. 2025.

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