COURSES Synonyms: 243 Similar and Opposite Words

courses 1 of 2

noun

plural of course

as in procedures

a way of acting or proceeding the president's usual course has been to obtain advice from several people and then make up his own mind

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Relevance

as in classes

a series of lectures on a subject a course on American history from the colonial period to the present

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as in processes

a usually fixed or ordered series of actions or events leading to a result set out on the course that would lead to a college degree

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as in routes

the direction along which something or someone moves the river follows a southeasterly course to the ocean

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as in canals

an open man-made passageway for water the Erie Canal was replaced by a much larger course, the New York State Barge Canal

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courses

2 of 2

verb

present tense third-person singular of course

as in tracks

to go after or on the track of after coursing the conspirators for months, the federal agents closed in and made the arrests

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as in traverses

to make one's way through, across, or over once the threat of terrorism became apparent, fighter jets began coursing that corridor on a daily basis

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as in races

to proceed or move quickly racehorses coursing down the track

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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 courses

Noun

Cruisers University offers seminars and hands-on courses that aim to build confidence and improve sailing skills, the release said. — Michelle Richardson, CBS News, 13 Oct. 2026 The nine courses move between drink and dish, from a Sundarban honey mead with cotton candy to a Tooyamalli rice cocktail with clarified rasam, whiskey and rice foam, served alongside a Gunpowder Idli filled with pepper crab and caviar. — Karina Acharya, Condé Nast Traveler, 12 Oct. 2026 Dinner at Creola is a set-menu affair, a half-dozen courses developed and cooked by the chef-owner, Lana Lagomarsini. — Helen Rosner, New Yorker, 11 Oct. 2026 The backroom courses in English, math, or nursing are no substitute for those shut down by the government. — Mark Sappenfield, Christian Science Monitor, 9 Oct. 2026 Computer science students are often taught to build these classifiers in machine learning courses. — Wen Shao, Fortune, 8 Oct. 2026 Instead of focusing exclusively on prompting, the courses walk through practical applications, including Excel formulas and pivot tables, front-end web development, project management, communication, reporting, and workflow automation. — Stackcommerce Team, PC Magazine, 7 Oct. 2026 Many K-8th grade students receive a smattering of foreign language instruction (a day or two a week, or a quarter), but then they are expected to take year-long courses in foreign language in high school to satisfy university requirements. — Doug Wojcieszak, Washington Post, 5 Oct. 2026 At the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, engineering professorSayan Mitra said several courses use robotic arms, drones, humanoids and vehicles from China. — Stephanie Yang, CNN Money, 3 Oct. 2026

Verb

What could be a stock campus ice-queen role is subverted throughout the season, through the empathy for the character that courses through her performance. — Rebecca Alter, Vulture, 27 July 2026 The same love of equality and freedom that courses through the Declaration motivated her white great-grandmother to campaign for suffrage and her African American grandfather to found a chapter of the NAACP in the Jim Crow South. — Michael Kazin, The Atlantic, 3 June 2026 And about the obsession that courses through dozens of countries on the continent. — Henry Bushnell, New York Times, 3 June 2026 But Open, Heaven also courses with youth’s great agony, the cruelty that learning to love should be inexorably followed by learning to grieve its undoing. — Gabrielle Bellot, Literary Hub, 27 Feb. 2026 Such is the power of cachaça, the essential and irresistible Brazilian sugar cane spirit that courses through each round of tropical cocktails passed across the bar. — Elazar Sontag, Washington Post, 26 Feb. 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for courses

Noun

For private schemes, the requirements include publicly available criteria, independent monitoring of compliance and procedures to withdraw or suspend a label when requirements are breached.

— Alexandra Harrell, Footwear News, 12 Oct. 2026
While those patients still exist, new data suggests more and more patients are seeking out the procedures at a younger age.

— William Jones, Miami Herald, 12 Oct. 2026

Definition of procedures

Noun

Yes; on-site massages and private yoga classes can be scheduled in advance.

— Condé Nast, Condé Nast Traveler, 13 Oct. 2026
Despite repairs that began on Monday, the restoration was not going to be done in time to allow classes to take place on Tuesday at the affected school districts.

— Paula Wethington, CBS News, 13 Oct. 2026

Definition of classes

Noun

Fear and loathing are running high as Hollywood processes Thursday’s shock firing of Bela Bajaria from her post as Netflix chief content officer.

— Matt Donnelly, Variety, 16 Oct. 2026
Atlas assembly overhaul The company released a nearly six-minute video showing how its manufacturing processes support rapid hardware development, letting engineers move from design changes to physical components and assembled robots faster.

— Jijo Malayil, Interesting Engineering, 15 Oct. 2026

Definition of processes

Noun

One of the first to try on that hat was the agency's Perseverance rover on Mars, which used machine learning to plan and complete its first drive on the Red Planet using routes mapped out by generative AI in December 2025.

— Josh Dinner, Space.com, 16 Oct. 2026
Throughout the war, Russia has repeatedly bombarded Ukraine’s Black Sea and Danube river ports, leaving Kyiv increasingly reliant on alternative routes to get its grain exports to markets in Africa and the Middle East.

— ABC News, ABC News, 16 Oct. 2026

Definition of routes

Noun

Tech investment has more than quadrupled in the last three years, a boom unmatched in scale or speed by the rise of railways, canals, or the Internet.

— RUCHIR SHARMA, Foreign Affairs, 13 Oct. 2026
Meanwhile, security and environmental challenges along the Suez and Panama canals are directing more shipments through Southern California.

— Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 12 Oct. 2026

Definition of canals

Verb

Kevin Roose, co-host of the upcoming NPR podcast Machine Gods, formerly The New York Times' Hard Fork, tracks the handful of characters racing to make AI a commercial reality.

— Cooper Katz McKim, NPR, 16 Oct. 2026
Tracking illness in Colorado Colorado tracks flu and other respiratory illnesses year-round.

— Jennifer McRae, CBS News, 16 Oct. 2026

Definition of tracks

Verb

The Carolinian line heads from Charlotte to Raleigh and up the coast to New York City, and the Piedmont line traverses North Carolina.

— Eva Flowe October 9, Charlotte Observer, 9 Oct. 2026
This fourth full-length from the London jazz quintet traverses Black diasporic sound traditions — grime, reggae, Afrobeat — mulling over the question of how music so joyous can be rooted in histories of pain.

— Craig Jenkins, Vulture, 9 Sep. 2026

Definition of traverses

Verb

The high pressure air in the Great Basin races downhill to the coast.

— Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 15 Oct. 2026
These days, the market is awash in retailers and consumer plays that are leaking market cap as every investment dollar races out into the AI trade.

— Josh Brown,Sean Russo, CNBC, 8 Oct. 2026