scrubbing

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scrub

An action that's very common in our daily lives is scrubbing. We do it when we need to clean something thoroughly.

When we talk about scrubbing, we often think of washing dishes or cleaning the bathtub. But scrubbing can also be used for other kinds of cleaning like polishing shoes or even scraping off old paint from a wall. Some people use special tools called sponges or brushes to help with the job. Scrubbing is usually a more intense form of cleaning than just wiping something down, so we often save it for when things are really dirty or in need of some extra TLC.

How common is "scrubbing"?

Word scrubbing is considered rare in modern English.
It has a balanced usage among all categories: speech, fiction, newspapers and academic texts.

Definitions

verb

To rub hard; to wash with rubbing; usually, to rub with a wet brush, or with something coarse or rough, for the purpose of cleaning or brightening
Example: to scrub a floor
To rub anything hard, especially with a wet brush; to scour
To be diligent and penurious
Example: to scrub hard for a living
To call off a scheduled event; to cancel.
Example: Engineers had to scrub the satellite launch due to bad weather.
To eliminate or to correct data from a set of records to bring it inline with other similar datasets
Example: The street segment data from the National Post Office will need to be scrubbed before it can be integrated into our system.
(audio) To move a recording tape back and forth with a scrubbing motion to produce a scratching sound, or to do so by a similar use of a control on an editing system.
(audio, video) To maneuver the play position on a media editing system by using a scroll bar or touch-based interface.