Word.ws English Dictionary

occurring

Syllables: oc·cur·ringUK/əˈkɜːɹɪŋ//əˈkɝɪŋ/

occurring is the present participle and gerund of occur.

occurring is the present participle and gerund of occurre.

Meaning of occur

Verb

occur (third-person singular simple present occurs, present participle occurring, simple past and past participle occurred)

  1. (intransitive) To happen or take place.
    • The liftoff will occur in exactly twelve seconds.
    Synonyms:
    belimp
  2. (intransitive) To present or offer itself.
    • I will write if the opportunity occurs.
    Synonyms:
    appear, arise, come up
  3. (impersonal) To come or be presented to the mind; to suggest itself.
    • One little incident of my school days occurs to me as amusing.
    Synonyms:
    hit
  4. (intransitive) To be present or found.
    • The chemical monofluoroacetate occurs in all parts of Dichapetalum cymosum, and is responsible for its toxic effects.

Noun

occurring (plural occurrings)

  1. An instance of something occurring; an event or happening.
    • The perceived and known fact on which this discussion is based, is not the difference between the occurring and the non-occurring of an act (for non-occurring does not say impossibility), nor the difference between possibility and impossibility of the act (for the possibility cannot be perceived)...1976, J. R. T. M. Peters, God’s Created Speech: A Study in the Speculative Theology of the Muʿtazilî Qâḍîl-Quḍât Abû L-Ḥasan ʿAbd Al-Jabbâr Bn Aḥmad Al-Hamaḏânî, Leiden: E. J. Brill, →ISBN, page 197
    • While it was noted above that the interaffecting of the present by the occurrings and implyings of the past provides a means of generating a sense of a personal past through the accumulation of bodily-relevant occurrings and implyings, […]2016, Janet Banfield, Geography Meets Gendlin
    Synonyms:
    occurrence

Adjective

occurring (not comparable)

  1. (in-compounds) That occurs in a specified manner.
    • naturally occurring macromolecules

Synonyms of occurring

Forms of occurring

pluraloccurrings

Words formed from occurring

Phrases with occurring

Questions about occurring

What does occurring mean?
Occurring means an instance of something occurring; an event or happening.
What is occurring the present participle and gerund of?
Occurring is the present participle and gerund of occur.
What part of speech is occurring?
Occurring can be a noun or an adjective.
How do you pronounce occurring?
Occurring is pronounced /əˈkɝɪŋ/ (US).
What is the plural of occurring?
The plural of occurring is occurrings.

Words near occurring in the dictionary

  1. occurrential
  2. occurrentially
  3. occurrently
  4. occurrents
  5. occurres
  6. occurring
  7. occurrings
  8. occurs
  9. occurse
  10. occurses
  11. occursion

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: occurring (page history and authors); occur (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-occurring.ogg.

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