Word.ws English Dictionary

dissolving

dissolving is the present participle and gerund of dissolve.

Meaning of dissolve

Verb

dissolve (third-person singular simple present dissolves, present participle dissolving, simple past and past participle dissolved)

  1. (transitive) To terminate a union of multiple members actively, as by disbanding.
    • The ruling party or coalition sometimes dissolves parliament early when the polls are favorable, hoping to reconvene with a larger majority.
    Antonyms:
    establish, found
  2. (transitive) To destroy, make disappear.
  3. (transitive) To liquify, melt into a fluid.
    • as if the world were all dissolved to tears1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to...
    Synonyms:
    melt, formelt
  4. (intransitive) To be melted, changed into a fluid.
  5. (physical, transitive) To disintegrate chemically into a solution by immersion into a liquid or other material.
    • There was a legend that Cleopatra was accustomed to dissolve pearls in vinegar and drink the fluid in order to promote her amorousness.1961, Harry E. Wedeck, Dictionary of Aphrodisiacs, New York: The Citadel Press, page 65
  6. (intransitive, physical) To be disintegrated by such immersion.

See all 15 meanings of dissolve

Noun

dissolving (plural dissolvings)

  1. The act by which something dissolves.
    • For example, the only manifestation of solubility is dissolving, and being immersed in liquid is its only circumstances of manifestation. Perhaps there are some differences between particular immersions or dissolvings, but they must be similar enough […]2009, Gregor Damschen, Robert Schnepf, Karsten Stüber, Debating Dispositions

Forms of dissolving

pluraldissolvings

Phrases with dissolving

Questions about dissolving

What does dissolving mean?
Dissolving means the act by which something dissolves.
What is dissolving the present participle and gerund of?
Dissolving is the present participle and gerund of dissolve.
What part of speech is dissolving?
Dissolving is a noun.
What is the plural of dissolving?
The plural of dissolving is dissolvings.

Words near dissolving in the dictionary

  1. dissolvers
  2. dissolves
  3. dissolvest
  4. dissolveth
  5. dissolvible
  6. dissolving
  7. dissolving view
  8. dissolving views
  9. dissolvingly
  10. dissolvings
  11. dissonance

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dissolving (page history and authors); dissolve (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-dissolving.ogg.

Cite this entry: “dissolving.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dissolving. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.