Word.ws English Dictionary

weathering

/ˈwɛ.ðə.ɹɪŋ/

weathering noun: weather, especially favourable or fair weather. Also the present participle and gerund of weather.

Noun

weathering (countable and uncountable, plural weatherings)

  1. (obsolete) Weather, especially favourable or fair weather.
  2. Mechanical or chemical breaking down of rocks in situ by weather or other causes.
    • At that point the cuesta is 10 miles wide but the hilltops have an eastward descent of only about 62 feet. In its general eastward slope the surface of the cuesta is exactly that of one made by weathering and stream erosion, acting upon a gently-dipping limestone bed in a region never glaciated.1965, Lawrence Martin, The Physical Geography of Wisconsin, Univ of Wisconsin Press, →ISBN, page 217
    • Furthermore, changes in continental weathering and riverine contributions to the oceans may also be linked with climate, and hydrothermal inputs vary with tectonism.1997 August 15, John N. Christensen et al., “Climate and Ocean Dynamics and the Lead Isotopic Records in Pacific Ferromanganese Crusts”, in Science, volume 277, number 5328, →DOI, pages 913–918
  3. A slight inclination given to an approximately horizontal surface to enable it to throw off water.
  4. The action of weather on objects exposed to it.

Also used as

weathering is also the present participle and gerund of weather.

weathering meaning in Tagalog and Indonesian

weathering in Tagalog

breaking down of rocks
sapanhon

weathering in Indonesian

breaking down of rocks
pelapukan

Examples of weathering in a sentence

  • Saprolites form in the lower zones of soil profiles and represent deep weathering of the bedrock surface.
  • The thick-bedded dolostone's straticulate character was brought out as fine etched parallel grooves on the broken surfaces by weathering.
  • Because the present climate can never produce enough weathering to produce oxisols, torrox soils are always paleosols formed during periods of much wetter climates.

All 16 example sentences with weathering

Forms of weathering

pluralweatherings

Origin of weathering

From Middle English wederyng, equivalent to weather + -ing.

Words formed from weathering

Phrases with weathering

Questions about weathering

What does weathering mean?
Weathering means weather, especially favourable or fair weather.
What is weathering in Tagalog?
Weathering in Tagalog is sapanhon. See Weathering meaning in Tagalog.
What part of speech is weathering?
Weathering is a noun.
How do you pronounce weathering?
Weathering is pronounced /ˈwɛ.ðə.ɹɪŋ/.
What is the plural of weathering?
The plural of weathering is weatherings.

Words near weathering in the dictionary

  1. weatherglasses
  2. Weatherholt
  3. Weatherholts
  4. Weatherholtz
  5. Weatherholtzes
  6. weathering
  7. weathering a point
  8. weathering out
  9. weathering pan
  10. weathering steel
  11. weathering steels

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: weathering (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.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-weathering.wav.

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