How to use explanation in a sentence

40 example sentences · noun

Explanation means the act or process of explaining. Example: “The explanation was long and drawn-out.”

Examples of explanation by meaning

nounThe act or process of explaining.

The explanation was long and drawn-out.

nounSomething that explains or makes understandable.

An explanation for the UFO sightings was easily found.
But this is far from being the necessary or even the most likely explanation.1949, F. A. Hayek, “The Intellectuals and Socialism”, in University of Chicago Law Review, volume 16, number 3, Chicago: University of...

More sentences with explanation

He gave a convoluted explanation that amounted to little more than a weak excuse for his absence.From the entry convoluted
The public won't understand this concept. We need to dumb down our explanation of it.From the entry dumb down
When we confronted her, she gave us a hasty, incoherent explanation.From the entry incoherent
He gave me an unconvincing explanation of the fault, but I have my doubts.From the entry unconvincing
We asked for an explanation, but all we got was crickets.From the entry crickets
I just want the unembroidered truth, in small words, with no excuses or explanations.From the entry unembroidered
As soon as the admin arrived I was kickbanned from the channel with no explanation.From the entry kickban
The Universe has no explanation: it just is.From the entry be
Her calm explanation helped mollify their concerns.From the entry mollify
That explanation doesn’t jibe with the facts.From the entry jibe
Their proposed explanation at the time was riddled with teleology.From the entry teleology
He musta guessed. There's no other explanation.From the entry musta
I'm sure there's an innocent explanation for all this.From the entry innocent
The explanation involved potatoes, squirrels, and race cars.From the entry involved
For his explanation he allegorises the problem.From the entry allegorises
For his explanation he allegorised the problem.From the entry allegorised
For his explanation he is allegorising the problem.From the entry allegorising
For his explanation he will allegorize the problem.From the entry allegorize
The discovery of Verner's law provided an explanation for the medial voiced plosive in Old English fæder "father".From the entry Verner's law
That explanation does not hold good in this matter.From the entry hold good
Her bizarre explanation really stretches credulity.From the entry stretch
That brief explanation will never satisfy.From the entry satisfy
Her gaseous explanations left everyone confused.From the entry gaseous
The explanation left him completely befuddled.From the entry befuddle
He gave a tongue-in-cheek explanation of why the sky was blue, offering a theory about some primordial discount on light blue paint.From the entry tongue-in-cheek
There’s gotta be some sorta explanation.From the entry sorta
Shortly after the conversation turned to the results of the recent election, John silently stood from the table, and without explanation, precipitously walked out on the dinner party.From the entry precipitously
Criminal interrogation. Initially they will dream up explanations faster than you could ever do so, but when they become fatigued, often they will acknowledge that you have them cold.From the entry cold
Patches of cropped land and uncropped land were interspersed seemingly at random, but the explanation turned out to be related to crop rotation and irrigation choices.From the entry cropped
An out-of-universe explanation for Dr. Watson's wife calling him James in one story is that Doyle forgot his given name had already been established as John.From the entry out-of-universe
Teachers testing with informal reading inventories (selected because of comprehension difficulty unrelated to word recognition) were asked to give explanations for the miscomprehensions of their students.From the entry miscomprehension
I asked where he had been all day, and he launched into a detailed explanation about running into an old friend and being invited to a wedding.From the entry launch into
One possible explanation is that helping is driven by receiving or observing help.2025 November 13, Kamala Thiagarajan, “If you're going to be kind to another human, today is the day to do it!”, in NPR. From the entry pay it forward
The Norwegians’ immunity from the resource curse has a simple explanation.2025 November 4, Eric Levitz, “The most likely AI apocalypse: How artificial intelligence could be leading most humans into an inescapable…. From the entry resource curse
Bunboys and Hrothgals were rare because that was the explanation for why we couldn't play as them.2024 March 6, Snorc, Reddit. From the entry bunboy
Following are explanations of the function and usage of each case.2023, John Quijada, Grammar of The New Ithkuil. From the entry thematic
A few weeks later, the bank shut down the account without explanation.2023 March 15, Sam Brownback, Jeremy Tedesco, “Stop the Troubling Trend of Politically Motivated Debanking”, in Newsweek. From the entry debank

Meaning of explanation

noun The act or process of explaining.
noun Something that explains or makes understandable.
noun A resolution of disputed points pursuant to discussion; a mutual clarification of disputed points; reconciliation.

Full definition of explanation

Questions about explanation in a sentence

How do you use explanation in a sentence?: Explanation is used as a noun. For example: “The explanation was long and drawn-out.”
What is a short sentence with explanation?: “Her bizarre explanation really stretches credulity.”
What does explanation mean?: Explanation means the act or process of explaining.

Adapted from Wiktionary: explanation (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.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

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