EXCAVATING Synonyms: 15 Similar and Opposite Words

excavating

verb

present participle of excavate

as in digging

to hollow out or form (something) by removing earth workmen are excavating a long tunnel that will eventually replace the aboveground expressway

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Recent Examples of excavating An international team of roughly 60 researchers from 13 countries was excavating the site when the amulet was discovered. — Andrea Margolis, FOXNews.com, 26 Aug. 2026 Poliński, a professor at the Institute of Archaeology at Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Poland, and his colleagues began excavating the site in Pień near Dąbrowa Chełmińska in 2005. — Katie Hunt, CNN Money, 21 Aug. 2026 Similar to black-eyed Susans, coreopsis is divided by carefully excavating its clumps from the soil and cutting them into small sections, ensuring each has some foliage and roots present. — Madeline Buiano, Martha Stewart, 21 Aug. 2026 In July 2025, utility workers excavating trenches to expand an underground gas network in Peru's capital unearthed two pre-Incan tombs that were over 1,000 years old. — CBS News, 19 Aug. 2026 Never being satisfied with continuing to try and get deeper and deeper to who this individual is at their core, just constantly excavating. — Mike Ryan, IndieWire, 13 Aug. 2026 Years spent researching Kelly has spent years researching, roaming and excavating the former Multnomah Plantation, established in 1854, in Kansas City near Liberty after discovering the story of Dougherty’s home decades ago. — Jenna Ebbers, Kansas City Star, 12 Aug. 2026 Gray has spent much of his career excavating the particular anxieties of New York families trying to climb a few rungs higher in society. — Sophie Miller, Rolling Stone, 10 Aug. 2026 The roughly six-mile-wide (10-kilometer-wide) asteroid struck Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula, excavating the Chicxulub crater and vaporizing enormous quantities of rock. — Stefanie Waldek, Space.com, 1 Aug. 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for excavating

digging

Verb

With little in the way of young players or draft capital aside from Wagler, scoring a big star in free agency is probably their best hope of digging themselves out of this mess in the next decade or so.

— John Hollinger, New York Times, 3 Sep. 2026
The company had sent heavy machinery to the site, an undeveloped valley in northeast Independence, a month earlier to start tilling the earth and digging runoff ponds.

— Ilana Arougheti, Kansas City Star, 2 Sep. 2026

Definition of digging

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excavates

excavating

excavation

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“Excavating.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/excavating. Accessed 5 Sep. 2026.

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Synonyms of excavating

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