Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use commonplace in a sentence

40 example sentences · adjective, noun, verb

Commonplace means ordinary; not having any remarkable characteristics. Example: “Such corruption is commonplace in a world of supine civil servants and underfunded ministries.”

Examples of commonplace by meaning

adjectiveOrdinary; not having any remarkable characteristics.

  • I could get hold of nothing but of some commonplace phrases, those futile phrases that give the measure of our impotence before each other's trials.1911, Joseph Conrad, chapter 1, in Under Western Eyes
  • Commonplace sounds had turned into threats.1970, Wally Ferris, Across 110th, page 193
  • In the old days, hopping onto the platform from a not-yet-stopped train was a commonplace stunt for daily commuters in a hurry.2025 July 9, Frank Mueller, “Protecting the railway from new and existing dangers”, in RAIL, number 1039, page 62

nounA platitude or cliché.

  • And something angered Tamara in the way the Prince assisted in all this, out-commonplacing her friend in commonplaces with the suavest politeness.1910, Elinor Glyn, chapter 4, in His Hour

nounSomething that is ordinary; something commonly done or occurring.

  • And, placed discreetly among these commonplaces, a few pieces of genuine quality, bizarrely distinguished by craftsmanship from the vulgar products of the machine.1950, Norman Lindsay, Dust or Polish?, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 150
  • The smallest commonplace of domestic life, so amiable to the healthy mind, lacerates like a blade.1988 December 19, William Styron, “Why Primo Levi Need Not Have Died”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

More sentences with commonplace

  • Such corruption is commonplace in a world of supine civil servants and underfunded ministries.From the entry supine
  • Washboards went the way of the dinosaurs when washing machines became commonplace.From the entry go the way of the dinosaurs
  • However, many members of the religious right don't think prayer in public schools should be commonplace.From the entry religious right
  • Teen phenoms were relatively commonplace back then, especially on the women’s side, occasionally on the men’s.2021 September 11, Tim Lewis, “Focused, fearless, unflappable – the teenage stars taking sport by storm”, in The Observer, →ISSN. From the entry phenom
  • How commonplace our political leaders' overt displays of baboon-like "brute virility".2021 June 15, The Canberra Times, page 37. From the entry Tarzanism
  • Prior to the Internet becoming commonplace, the common medium was the floppy disc.2014, Kenneth A. Spencer, All About Your Computer: An Explanation of the Computer for the Interested User, →ISBN, page 210. From the entry virusses
  • The claim that policing has become dangerously overcentralised is now a political commonplace.2009 September 4, Editorial, “Police accountability: Boris on the beat”, in Guardian. From the entry overcentralised
  • A name, my father Bix Rampike believed, to set its bearer apart from the merely commonplace.2008, Joyce Carol Oates, My Sister, My Love, HarperCollins, →ISBN, page 4. From the entry Skyler
  • One commonplace theft was the snatch-and-run perpetrated around the central business area by boys or young men.1995, John C. Weaver, “The Enduring Circumstances of Violence and Theft”, in Crimes, Constables, and Courts: Order and Transgression in a…. From the entry snatch and run
  • Many an ancient commonplace is weird news to the nowaday ear.1984, David Farrelly, The book of bamboo, page 83. From the entry nowaday
  • From a dreary, commonplace piece to a smart colorful chair shining with personality.1937 April 24, Washington Post, page 12. From the entry presto chango
  • Carrados?" asked Larch, coming down to the commonplace of the situation.1934, Ernest Bramah, The Bravo of London. From the entry stalemate
  • Paine "was a commonplace rebel, entirely practical." Not educated, not a deep thinker.1923 May 19, “Mixed Motives”, in Time. From the entry deep thinker
  • It's also becoming more commonplace for artists to add some of their own sound effects while they're drawing the art.2021, Nate Piekos, The Essential Guide to Comic Book Lettering, page 184. From the entry sound effect
  • The future is often varnished, and that may be expected, but rose-tinting the present may be equally commonplace.2016, Richard Bolden, Morgen Witzel, Nigel Linacre, Leadership Paradoxes: Rethinking Leadership for an Uncertain World, →ISBN. From the entry rose-tint
  • Shooting stars, meteors, and bizarre occurrences were commonplace.2013, "Pete", The Mexican Fisherman, page 45. From the entry 10.0
  • But the other kind of commonplace book was different.2012 January 23, Alan Jacobs, “‘Commonplace Books’: Tumblrs of an Earlier Era”, in The Atlantic. From the entry commonplace book
  • But in every instance the commonplace thing is transformed by metaphor, the figure that moves the object toward the metaquotidian.2009, Robert D. Denham, The Early Poetry of Charles Wright: A Companion, 1960-1990, →ISBN, page 65. From the entry metaquotidian
  • It goldened, as nothing else goldened, the commonplace countryside.1994, Marion H. Hedges, Iron City. From the entry golden
  • But this descriptive commonplace is not sufficient to account for the sort of comportability-predicated integrity we have been talking about.1994, The Personalist Forum, volume 10 to 13, The Furman University Press - Originally: The Michigan University Press, page 159. From the entry comportability
  • These ideas became, almost immediately, a commonplace in the celebrations of English that continue to excite matrilingual sentiments.1991, Richard W[eld] Bailey, “English Abroad”, in Images of English: A Cultural History of the Language, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of…. From the entry matrilingual
  • You can channel significant things into the commonplace.1982, Don DeLillo, chapter 7, in The Names, New York: Vintage, published 1989, page 160. From the entry laze
  • To commonplace actions he brought a special pedantic awkwardness.1970, Saul Bellow, chapter 1, in Mr. Sammler’s Planet, Greenwich, CT: Fawcett, published 1971, page 11. From the entry unacquainted
  • The wounds and balms of the human condition are so commonplace that men eventually experience them without noticing.1970 May 18, “Alive and Well”, in Time. From the entry human condition
  • Famous hotels, for instance, are astonishingly commonplace.1946, George Johnston, Skyscrapers in the Mist, page 85. From the entry astonishingly
  • "Your face is curiously like Pan's," said Lou to him at dinner. ¶ It was true, in a commonplace sense.1925, D. H. Lawrence, St Mawr. From the entry goaty
  • First, he may derationalise, or remove as far as possible from commonplace experience, the general surroundings amidst which the supernatural is to appear.2011, Richard Green Moulton, Shakespeare as a Dramatic Artist, →ISBN. From the entry derationalise
  • Financially, the two New York teams have not asked for the sort of free ride at taxpayer expense that has been commonplace elsewhere.2006 April 9, “A Yankees Station in the Bronx”, in New York Times, retrieved 11 Jun 2009. From the entry free ride
  • In contrast, authors of junk fiction draw their contents from a repertoire of codified commonplaces that are catachresized in a macrocode of the reader's imagination.2004, Phenomenological Inquiry, volumes 28-30, page 122. From the entry macrocode
  • We live in a culture where ads for “male enhancement” are commonplace, and currently, three drugs—Viagra, Levitra, and Cialis—compete for the erectile dysfunction market.2004, Meika Loe, The Rise of Viagra: How the Little Blue Pill Changed Sex in America, NYU Press, →ISBN, page 3. From the entry male enhancement
  • Such IrDA ports (named for the Infrared Data Association) are commonplace on personal digital assistants, notebook computers and printers, but Bluetooth is gaining ground.2000 September 27, “A Digital Pen That Wows”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived…. From the entry IrDA
  • Tylor's idea that humans have only one choice, namely either to marry out or to die out, has become the most commonplace functional explanation.1991, Trudeke Vuyk, Children of One Womb. From the entry marry out
  • For zealous Lovecraftians there are a few choice tidbits—a short autobiography, his commonplace book, and his “History and Chronology of the Necronomicon.”1944, The New York Times Book Review, page 19. From the entry Lovecraftian
  • We want to see how far our readers can get the best impression of an ordinary, commonplace, ugly, commercial, shoppy or warehousy street.1902, Practical Junior Photographer, page 277. From the entry warehousy

Meaning of commonplace

  1. adjective Ordinary; not having any remarkable characteristics.
  2. noun A platitude or cliché.
  3. noun Something that is ordinary; something commonly done or occurring.

Full definition of commonplace

Questions about commonplace in a sentence

How do you use commonplace in a sentence?
Commonplace is used as an adjective, noun and verb. For example: “Such corruption is commonplace in a world of supine civil servants and underfunded ministries.”
What is a short sentence with commonplace?
“Commonplace sounds had turned into threats.”
What does commonplace mean?
Commonplace means ordinary; not having any remarkable characteristics.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: commonplace (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use commonplace in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/commonplace. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.