JERKED Synonyms: 82 Similar and Opposite Words

jerked

verb

past tense of jerk

as in yanked

to move or cause to move with a sharp quick motion I jerked to one side to avoid getting hit jerked the leash to get the dog's attention

Synonyms & Similar Words

Relevance

as in twitched

to make jerky or restless movements you've got to quit jerking, or the barber will nick you by accident

Synonyms & Similar Words

Antonyms & Near Antonyms

as in shook

to make a series of small irregular or violent movements the car jerked with every shift of the gear

Synonyms & Similar Words

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 jerked During the test, Linton jerked and twitched in what prosecutors described as an attempt to fake a seizure. — James Queally, Los Angeles Times, 2 Oct. 2026 Somewhere nearby, in a dark office, an eavesdropping oreja has just jerked to attention on his hard little chair. — Literary Hub, 3 Sep. 2026 Once the squid gather near the surface, lines fitted with bait are lowered into the water and rapidly jerked up and down to imitate small prey such as shrimp, triggering strikes before the catch is reeled aboard. — Bojan Stojkovski, Interesting Engineering, 20 June 2026 Suddenly, the tent jerked and wobbled. — Dolores Brown, Outdoor Life, 17 June 2026 In the summer of 2020, former Morgan Stanley trader Adam Crawley was wandering through Indonesia, Thailand and Australia, perfecting his qigong with a man called Master YanG, when a cold message on LinkedIn jerked him back to reality. — Phoebe Liu, Forbes.com, 26 May 2026 My empty paper bowl jerked along the belt, stopping under each funnel. — Billy Perrigo, Time, 8 May 2026 The plane jerked to a stop as two trucks passed just feet in front of its nose. — Alexandra Skores, CNN Money, 16 Apr. 2026 We are jerked between past and present as his backstory gets filled in, one jogged memory at a time. — Justin Chang, New Yorker, 13 Mar. 2026

Recent Examples of Synonyms for jerked

Verb

Ignoring that rule could get flood insurance coverage yanked for an entire community.

— Alex Harris, Miami Herald, 16 Oct. 2026
Wi-Fi is not free on those services; T-Mobile used to comp at least an hour of connectivity for subscribers, but quietly yanked that benefit in April.

— Rob Pegoraro, PC Magazine, 15 Oct. 2026

Definition of yanked

Verb

The crossing left at least 140 migrants dead and shook the city perched on the Mediterranean coast.

— JOSEPH WILSON, Arkansas Online, 14 Oct. 2026
Both were arrested and were being held in separate prisons in the central city of Isfahan over their participation in the nationwide January protests that shook the Islamic republic.

— Frank Andrews, CBS News, 13 Oct. 2026

Definition of shook

Verb

Yet Abrams still won’t kvetch about being crammed into a tiny whale-stomach set with a camera crew, while a half-dozen crew members surrounding the practical gut, wielding a gimbal, tossed him around like a wet rag doll.

— Brian Davids, HollywoodReporter, 16 Oct. 2026
Ohtani turned to the Dodgers’ dugout, spread his arms wide and tossed his bat to the side.

— Maddie Lee, Los Angeles Times, 16 Oct. 2026

Definition of tossed

Verb

Conservatives shuddered to think how close the country had come to permanent entangling alliances.

— Beverly Gage, New Yorker, 28 Sep. 2026
McDonald’s shares fell nearly 5% Wednesday, their largest percentage drop since April 2025, as investors shuddered at the eye-popping price of improving McDonald’s 46,000 global stores.

— Dee-Ann Durbin, Los Angeles Times, 24 Sep. 2026

Definition of shuddered

Verb

Shohei Ohtani emerged from the visiting dugout at American Family Field with a bat in his hand, and the mass of media members scattered in foul territory up the third-base line shifted his way, pulled by the magnetic force that is Ohtani’s stardom.

— Maddie Lee, Los Angeles Times, 14 Oct. 2026
On Wednesday, the Congressional Leadership Fund, the House Republicans' super PAC, effectively dropped its push to boost Tijerina and pulled millions of dollars in ads from the district, a person familiar with the decision confirmed.

— Justin Papp, CNBC, 14 Oct. 2026

Definition of pulled

Verb

One woman ordered some home furniture while two children fidgeted nearby.

— David Lyons, Sun Sentinel, 23 Mar. 2026
Between each dance was an excruciating silence during which network-TV producers monitored and reset their equipment while the men fidgeted onstage like excitable children.

— Rebecca Jennings, Vulture, 20 Mar. 2026