coalesce
Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for October 15, 2025 is:
coalesce \koh-uh-LESS\ verb
To coalesce is to come together to form one group or mass.
// The club’s community service projects provide students with a common goal to coalesce around.
// The movie is full of beautifully written scenes but they never coalesce into a whole.
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Examples:
“... as Angola prepares for the final, the combination of personal perseverance, team cohesion, and national pride coalesces into something bigger than a game: a celebration of resilience, dedication, and the enduring spirit of basketball in Angola.” — Sindiswa Mabunda, Forbes, 24 Aug. 2025
Did you know?
The meaning of many English words equals the sum of their parts, and coalesce is a fitting example. The word unites the prefix co- (“together”) and the Latin verb alescere, meaning “to grow.” Coalesce is one of a number of English verbs (along with mix, commingle, merge, and amalgamate) that refer to the act of combining parts into a whole. In particular, coalesce usually implies the merging of similar parts to form a cohesive unit, such as a political ideology, a fan-following, or (perish the thought) a Portuguese man-of-war, the body of which includes three types of zooids.
