Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use downplay in a sentence

17 example sentences · verb

Downplay means to de-emphasize; to present or portray as less important or consequential. Example: “I tried to downplay the importance of the scandal.”

Examples of downplay by meaning

verbTo de-emphasize; to present or portray as less important or consequential.

  • John Cassavetes, as usual, downplays the plot, opting for character and endless improvisation, but it does not entirely work in this setting.1984, Marc Sigoloff, The Films of the Seventies, A Filmography of American, British and Canadian Films 1970–1979, page 158

More sentences with downplay

  • I tried to downplay the importance of the scandal.From the entry down-
  • Our conversation is in French, since he downplays his ability to speak English “out of sectarianism”.2025 May 3, Leila Abboud, “Lunch with the FT: Jean-Luc Mélenchon”, in FT Weekend (Life & Arts section), London: The Financial Times Ltd.…. From the entry sectarianism
  • Like in a way you're downplaying how good this guy has been domestically the last 3-4 years.2024 March 9, u/djpain20, “T1 vs. Gen.G / LCK 2024 Spring - Week 7 / Post-Match Discussion”, in Reddit, r/leagueoflegends, archived from…. From the entry gap
  • "The President never downplayed the virus," according to press secretary Kayleigh McEnany.2021, Charles Finch, What Just Happened: Notes on a Long Year, page 184. From the entry we have always been at war with Eastasia
  • But I did sense that you were deliberately trying to downplay your attractiveness, for whatever reason.1996, Emma Brookes, chapter 9, in Dead Even, New York, N.Y.: St. Martin’s Paperbacks, →ISBN, page 95. From the entry chopped liver
  • I have never clickbaited anyone with overexaggerated titles, but also never downplayed the severity of the content within.2017, Brian Whitney, Subversive: Interviews with Radicals, →ISBN. From the entry clickbait
  • The Ghanaian government employed several Afros, as many of the expatriates called themselves, downplaying their Americanness, in ideological and infrastructure-building occupations.2012, Kevin K. Gates, American Africans in Ghana: Black Expatriates and the Civil Rights Era, University of North Carolina Press (2006)…. From the entry afro
  • And I know I have downplayed their celebrityness.2010, Ilene Angel, In Search of George Stephanopoulos. From the entry celebrityness
  • Cybertext may promote such a strong feeling of distance between readers, writers, and texts that referentiality to material conditions is downplayed.2002, Cheryl J Fish, Yi-Chun Tricia Lin, Women's studies then and now. From the entry cybertext
  • You could create problems for your company if you downplay current products and hype the dreamware that may never become reality.1999, Kay Palkhivala, Anne Anderson-Lemieux, Charles Mappin, “Serving Many Masters”, in Jessica Keyes, editor, Internet Management (Best…. From the entry dreamware
  • They rely too heavily on auditor's terms which sometimes have the effect of downplaying the nature and extent of the problem.1992, United States House Committee on Government Operations, Taking a Byte Out of History: The Archival Preservation of Federal Computer…. From the entry pablumese
  • There's no foulup so lame that keepers of the flame like Andrew Bacevich, the modern Alibi Ike, can't excuse, spin and downplay.2014 June 6, HarryRPitts, comment on "Benghazi, Bowe Bergdahl, and manufactured brouhaha" by Andrew Bacevich, Boston Globe (retrieved 10…. From the entry Alibi Ike
  • As a hero of Teen Wolf, Derek is not woobified in the traditional sense of the word, but some fans do feel that his flaws are downplayed in fic.2020, Katharine Elizabeth McCain, "Today Your Barista Is: Genre Characteristics in The Coffee Shop Alternate Universe", dissertation…. From the entry woobify
  • Or was the downplaying deliberate, a postchivalrous response to obscure their role in the great women’s epic, as good allies should; that certainly has been the effect.2017, Brooke Kroeger, “A Coda: ‘The Least Tribute We Can Pay Them’: 1918–1920”, in The Suffragents: How Women Used Men to Get the Vote…. From the entry suffragent
  • But rather than drawing on extant rich stories about female superheroes, contemporary comic-based movies either downplay their powers and their personalities or rewrite them as trashy high camp.2008 September 19, Ta-Nehisi Coates, quoting Alyssa Rosenberg, “Why is Hollywood ignoring She-Hulk?”, in The Atlantic. From the entry high camp
  • A particularly robust critic was the sociologist Tariq Modood, who argued that the blanket term black 'harmed British Asians' by eliding their specific experiences and downplaying their own cultural inheritances.2023, Colm Murphy, Futures of Socialism, page 173. From the entry political blackness

Meaning of downplay

  1. verb To de-emphasize; to present or portray as less important or consequential.

Full definition of downplay

Questions about downplay in a sentence

How do you use downplay in a sentence?
Downplay is used as a verb. For example: “I tried to downplay the importance of the scandal.”
What is a short sentence with downplay?
“And I know I have downplayed their celebrityness.”
What does downplay mean?
Downplay means to de-emphasize; to present or portray as less important or consequential.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: downplay (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 downplay in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/downplay. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.