agonizar

To be dying, in the final throes of death — el paciente agonizaba en la cama del hospital. Figuratively, it also describes something in its last, failing stretch: la empresa agoniza, la tradición agoniza. Weightier and more literal than the broader morir (to die).

• El herido agonizaba cuando llegó la ambulancia. — The wounded man was dying when the ambulance arrived.
• La pequeña librería agonizaba desde hacía meses. — The little bookshop had been dying a slow death for months.
• Agonizó rodeado de su familia. — He died a slow death surrounded by his family.

Using agonizar as a casual synonym for morir — agonizar specifically describes the drawn-out process of dying (or figuratively, failing), not the moment of death itself; morir covers the plain act of dying.

Often confused with morir.