adulting

a·dult·ing
A1D2U1L1T1I1N1G2

noun

Activities typically associated with adulthood.

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Meanings

nounadulting (uncountable)
  1. slanguncountableActivities typically associated with adulthood.
  2. nonstandarduncountableAdultery.
verb
  1. gerundparticiplepresentpresent participle and gerund of adult

    Then how about this: How about out-adulting the person who's driving you crazy. In other words, being the bigger adult.

    2010, Kenneth Jedding, Higher education: on life, landing a job, and everything else they didn't teach you in college, Emmaus, PA: Rodale, →ISBN, page 210
    1 more example

    Trends in the relative costs of child rearing cannot be separated from the economic, social and cultural consequences of both the gendering and adulting of labour markets.

    2007, Jane Humphries, “ 'Because they are too menny...' children, mothers, and fertility decline: the evidence from working-class autobiographies of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries”, in Angélique Janssens, editor, Gendering the fertility decline in the Western world, Population, family, and society, volume 7, Bern [u.a.]: Peter Lang, →ISBN, page 116

Origin

From adult + -ing.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

adulting. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/adulting

MLA

“adulting.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/adulting. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “adulting,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/adulting.

Source: adulting on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.