chip away at

1. 1.

   remove or withdraw gradually: "These new customs are chipping away at the quality of life"

   Synonymschip away

   Broaderremove

Questions about chip away at

What does chip away at mean?

chip away at means "remove or withdraw gradually: "These new customs are chipping away at the quality of life"".

What is another word for chip away at?

Close synonyms include chip away. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is chip away at a common word?

chip away at is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.