white-knuckle

white-knuckle adjective: causing fear, excitement, apprehension, suspense, or nervousness.

Adjective

white-knuckle (not comparable)

(idiomatic) Causing fear, excitement, apprehension, suspense, or nervousness.
- "No surprise given both Bellamy and White share - or have inherited - Hendrix's unique blend of experimental instincts and white-knuckle showmanship," said Mr Goldsmith.2009 November 27, “Jimi Hendrix's Voodoo Child has 'best guitar riff'”, in BBC
- BP said its capped-off well appeared to be holding steady Friday morning, almost midway into a white-knuckle waiting period in which engineers watched the pressure gauges for signs of a leak.2010 July 16, Colleen Long and Harry R. Weber, "BP capped well holding nearly a day into new fix", Associated Press wire

white-knuckle (third-person singular simple present white-knuckles, present participle white-knuckling, simple past and past participle white-knuckled)

(transitive) To endure despite feeling terror, fear, apprehension, anxiety, discomfort, or torment.
- The rest of the drive home I white knuckled it.2010, Tanya Ebert, Mystical Puzzle, page 24
- “I white-knuckled it down there. Went as fast as I could. I didn't tell anyone I was going. When I got there, they wouldn't let me in. Because I wasn't family.”2017, Susan Mallery, Maisey Yates, Baby, It's Christmas & Hold Me, Cowboy
(transitive) To grip tightly in fear, apprehension, suspense, or nervousness.
- That lifting sensation is so strong, I inadvertently feel myself white-knuckling the hand grips.2020 November 2, a425couple, “Honda Pulls Mario Andretti From Driving the Two-Seater IndyCar”, in rec.autos.sport.nascar (Usenet)

Most of the Denver-based Monitor writer’s work is less white-knuckle.2025 November 14, Clayton Collins, Jingnan Peng, “Getting access and clarity on the immigration beat: ‘I just ask. And ask again.’”, in The...
Some J-CATs didn't even take medication, meaning they white-knuckle this lifestyle, possibly unaware of their deviation from reality and normality.2023, Justin Cook, Infectious Injustice:

Adjective
alternative form	white knuckle
Verb
third-person singular present	white-knuckles
present participle	white-knuckling
past participle	white-knuckled
past	white-knuckled

Evoking the imagery of tightly clenched hands with reduced bloodflow to the knuckles.

What does white-knuckle mean?: White-knuckle means causing fear, excitement, apprehension, suspense, or nervousness.
How do you use white-knuckle in a sentence?: Most of the Denver-based Monitor writer’s work is less white-knuckle.
What part of speech is white-knuckle?: White-knuckle can be an adjective or a verb.

Adapted from Wiktionary: white-knuckle (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: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-white-knuckle.ogg.

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