Synonyms

evade

American

[ih-veyd] / ɪˈveɪd /

verb (used with object)

to escape from by trickery or cleverness.

to evade one's pursuers.

Synonyms:

dodge, avoid

Antonyms:

confront, face
to get around by trickery.

to evade rules.
to avoid doing or fulfilling.

to evade an obligation.
to avoid answering directly.

to evade a question.
to elude; escape.

The solution evaded him.

verb (used without object)

to avoid doing or fulfilling something.
to elude or get away from someone or something by craft or slyness; escape.

evade British

/ ɪˈveɪd /

verb

to get away from or avoid (imprisonment, captors, etc); escape
to get around, shirk, or dodge (the law, a duty, etc)
(also intr) to avoid answering (a question)

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Synonym Usage

See escape.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

Inflected Forms

Participles

Conjugated Forms

Present

Past

Future

Etymology

Origin of evade

First recorded in 1505–15; from Latin ēvādere “to pass over, go out,” equivalent to ē- “out of, from” + vādere “to go, walk” see e- ¹

Explanation

When you evade something, you escape it. You could evade a police chase by slipping into a secret alley, or you could evade your mother's questions about the missing cookies by slipping into another topic. Other things people like to evade? Death. Taxes. Creepy ex-boyfriends. The verb evade comes from Latin roots ex ("away) and vadere ("to walk"), meaning literally "to walk away or to escape." Definitely what you want to do with creepy ex-boyfriends.

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Vocabulary lists containing evade

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Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

evade evades evaded evading

Staley denied the move was to help Epstein evade scrutiny.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 27, 2026

Shell companies are dangerous because they are used both by criminal organizations to evade sanctions and launder money and by the rich to avoid taxes.

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 27, 2026

"Offenders should not assume that they can evade detection simply by leaving Singapore after committing an offence," the Singapore Police Force said in a statement on Monday.

From BBC ● Aug. 25, 2026

Iran has weathered decades of crushing international sanctions, and before the war it continued to export millions of barrels of oil, mostly to China, and evade sanctions through complex international financial networks.

From Barron's ● Aug. 24, 2026

The silence irked Bigger; he was anxious to do something to evade looking so squarely at this problem.

From "Native Son" by Richard Wright

Chip falls in with a troupe of street performers, evades the police, juggles along the Seine and eventually wanders into a smoky bar, where Penelope is strumming her guitar.

From Salon ● Jun. 30, 2026

But how does one set out to write a biography about the creation of an author who not only can’t be reached, but actively evades the spotlight?

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 2, 2026

“It seems sometimes progress evades us,” Walker says.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 25, 2025

This "dark matter" is a mysterious entity that evades all forms of direct observation yet makes its presence felt through its invisible pull on visible objects.

From Science Daily ● Jun. 6, 2024

“Rats have no thumbs and therefore cannot do many things that we can. They cannot make tools or weapons. They are masters of destruction, but creation evades them,” said Vikus.

From "Gregor the Overlander" by Suzanne Collins

Mythos, developed by Anthropic, was said by the firm to be able to find weaknesses in systems in seconds which have long evaded human hackers.

From BBC ● Aug. 27, 2026

The driver successfully and momentarily evaded officers, who found his abandoned motorcycle, valued at $5,000, in a nearby alley, according to Buttitta.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 8, 2026

Even the perennial budget champion, however, hasn't evaded a "wave of price hikes", Yoshihiro Noro, former head of the Japan Natto Cooperative Society Federation, told AFP.

From Barron's ● Jun. 22, 2026

Amazon researchers showed some safeguards on Fable could be evaded, alarming White House officials.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 14, 2026

He swung the skimmer again, and the nimble fairy evaded capture a second time, soaring well out of range.

From "Fablehaven" by Brandon Mull

These mutations are adept at evading targeted treatments and were long considered “undruggable.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 26, 2026

First, Jefferson ran from one sideline to the other in the backfield, evading would-be defenders.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 21, 2026

It can also be deeply damaging when it becomes a means of evading the truth.

From Salon ● Jul. 13, 2026

Kent Police said after initially evading arrest, the suspect had run toward Tivoli Road in Margate.

From BBC ● Jun. 25, 2026

In evading and warding off wage increases, employers are of course behaving in an economically rational fashion; their business isn’t to make their employees more comfortable and secure but to maximize the bottom line.

From "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America" by Barbara Ehrenreich

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023