Contend
Contend verb - To engage in a contest.
Face
Face verb - To oppose (something hostile or dangerous) with firmness or courage.
Usage example: movie superheroes who are ever ready to face danger without blinking an eye
Contend and face are semantically related in come up against a situation topic. Sometimes you can use "Contend" instead a verb "Face".
Common collocations
Both words in one sentence
-
Korra found herself having to contend with The Equalists, whose public face was a nonviolent protest group, but was really a terrorist cell, secretly plotting to takeover the city.
Source: City of Adventure -
To be fair, the network had already scuttled the Pembleton stroke arc (which Braugher liked because he wanted to depict a Pembleton who had to face more challenge and difficulty in his work) and now he had to contend with being side-lined in favour of the network insisted super-model cop.
- An then it goes From Bad to Worse from that point on, where he has to contend with an invasion from the Netherrealm in Mortal Kombat X, creating a chain of events that lead to his FaceHeel Turn at the end of X.
Source: Fatal Flaw
Cite this Source
Face and Contend. (2016). Retrieved 2026, July 21, from https://thesaurus.plus/related/contend/face
Contend & Face. N.p., 2016. Web. 21 Jul. 2026. <https://thesaurus.plus/related/contend/face>.
Face or Contend. 2016. Accessed July 21, 2026. https://thesaurus.plus/related/contend/face.
Google Ngram Viewer shows how "contend" and "face" have occurred on timeline