# deserving

Pronunciation: say "di-ZUR-ving" US /dɪˈzɝvɪŋ/, UK /dɪˈzɜːvɪŋ/

## Adjective

1. Worthy of reward or praise; having earned good treatment through genuine merit.
   - Simple: Earning praise or a reward because of good actions or character.
   - _The scholarship went to a deserving candidate from a low-income background._
   - _Critics called him a deserving recipient of the lifetime achievement award._
2. Meriting reward or punishment; having earned a particular outcome through one's conduct.
   - Simple: Having earned something good or bad because of what you did.
   - _The judge considered him fully deserving of the harsh sentence._
   - _The volunteers proved themselves deserving of the town's gratitude._

## Verb

3. Present participle and gerund of deserve. — present participle and gerund of deserve
   - Simple: The -ing form of deserve. Use it to name the state or describe a noun, but rarely after is or are.
   - _Deserving a second chance and actually getting one are two different things._
   - _He insisted he had never done anything deserving such harsh treatment._

## Noun

4. Merit; that which a person earns or becomes entitled to by their conduct.
   - Simple: What a person has earned through their good or bad actions.
   - _Justice gives each person reward in proportion to their deserving._
   - _The estate was divided strictly by each heir's deserving._

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/deserving (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).