Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use pale in a sentence

40 example sentences · adjective, verb, noun

Pale means light in color. Example: “I have pale yellow wallpaper.”

Examples of pale by meaning

adjectiveLight in color.

  • I have pale yellow wallpaper.
  • She had pale skin because she didn't get much sunlight.
  • She turned pale and screamed on seeing the spider in the toilet.

adjectiveHaving a pallor (a light color, especially due to sickness, shock, fright etc.).

  • His face turned pale after hearing about his mother's death.
  • He was very easy to talk to with those long clown lines in his pale face, a natural goon, born rather too early she suspected.1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 5, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC

adjectiveFeeble, faint.

  • He is but a pale shadow of his former self.
  • The son's clumsy paintings are a pale imitation of his father's.
  • One community leader even tried to stop the introduction of a "domestic partnership" bill—at best a pale substitute for marriage—claiming that it would have polarized our opposition.1991 February 11, Jeffery R. Nickel, “Going To The Chapel”, in Gay Community News, volume 18, number 29, page 8

verbTo become insignificant.

  • Its financing pales next to the tens of billions that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will have at its disposal, especially with the coming infusion of some $3 billion a year from Warren E.2006 September 14, Katie Hafner, “Philanthropy Google’s Way: Not the Usual”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 27 Nov...

nounA wooden stake; a picket.

  • Ceiling joists were sometimes grooved to receive riven staves or pales that secured mud-and-straw walling.1997, Gabrielle M. Lanier, Bernard L. Herman, Everyday Architecture of the Mid-Atlantic, page 90

nounLimits, bounds (especially before of).

  • Men so situated, beyond the pale of the honor and the law, are not to be trusted.1900, Jack London, The Son of the Wolf:The Wisdom of the Trail
  • All things considered, we advise the male reader to keep his desires in check till he is at least twenty-five, and the female not to enter the pale of wedlock until she has attained the age of twenty.1919, B. G. Jefferis, J. L. Nichols, Searchlights on Health:When and Whom to Marry

nounThe territory around Calais under English control (from the 14th to 16th centuries).

  • He knows the fortifications – crumbling – and beyond the city walls the lands of the Pale, its woods, villages and marshes, its sluices, dykes and canals.2009, Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall, Fourth Estate, published 2010, page 402
  • A low-lying, marshy enclave stretching eighteen miles along the coast and pushing some eight to ten miles inland, the Pale of Calais nestled between French Picardy to the west and, to the east, the imperial-dominated territories of Flanders.2011, Thomas Penn, Winter King, Penguin, published 2012, page 73

More sentences with pale

  • A Japanese will typically have black hair, brown eyes, and pale skin.From the entry Japanese
  • For brewing our bitters we only use pale malt, torrefied wheat, and hops.From the entry torrefied
  • The unstained hardwood floor was pale, but the finish soaked in and made the room seem dark.From the entry unstained
  • The shells we found on the beach were varyingly white, pink, and pale yellow.From the entry varyingly
  • The neopagan ritual was only a pale shadow of the ones the Greeks held thousands of years ago.From the entry shadow
  • We all saw it: he paled noticeably.From the entry noticeably
  • The dark mountains stood out starkly against the pale sky.From the entry starkly
  • This is pale in comparison to that.From the entry pale in comparison
  • For quotations using this term, see Citations:pale male.From the entry pale male
  • Their most popular product, an assortment of ales, is packaged such that there are always at least two bottles of India pale ale in any case.From the entry in any case
  • The drawings, undermade, will give a tolerably exact idea of shape; the size averaged four inches, and three-quarters of an inch in diameter, color being a very pale yellow.From the entry undermade
  • It was a boy, blond, with nearly white hair and pale skin.2024 January 11, Madelyn Lapierre, The Astro Chronicles, Fulton Books, Inc., →ISBN. From the entry shink
  • Leather, iron, and gold paled in comparison to the strength, durability, and protection diamond gear provided.2023 October 9, Zackerie Fairfax, “How to get Netherite in Minecraft – crafting guide and tips”, in Dexerto. From the entry pale in comparison
  • If something is truly beyond the pale, of course, step in and fight.2023 October 20, David Ramsey, “Busybody Republicans and their neurotic quest to control public education”, in Arkansas Times. From the entry rightthink
  • She was on her side and the pale light lay draped across the curve of her body.2021, Michael Farris Smith, chapter 40, in Nick, New York; Boston; London: Little, Brown and Company, page 207. From the entry on one's side
  • Pale tourists, tired but excited, emerge like apparitions from the heat haze that shimmers over the tarmac.2018, Tsitsi Dangarembga, chapter 22, in This Mournable Body, Minneapolis: Graywolf Press. From the entry shimmer
  • The stories were interesting the first few times I heard them but they paled with the retelling.2018, Betty Webb, The Otter of Death. From the entry Hemingway
  • You're as pale as a lily and as thin as a yard of pump water.2018, Gloria Cook, Never Just a Memory, Canelo, →ISBN. From the entry thin as a yard of pump water
  • Then they all got back to banging on about triples, and pale ales and kölsches and whatever.2016, William McInnes, Full Bore, Hachette Australia, →ISBN. From the entry kölsch
  • Your face is all scrunged up and you're pale as a ghost.2016, Al Miller, Who Is Barton T. Jones?: The Farmer in the Bush, page 118. From the entry scrunge
  • Beulah's mother came over with her silent watchingness and leaned over her pale daughter.2016, Alexandra Glynn, Escaped from the Nations, page 15. From the entry watchingness
  • Her pale blue-blues glare out from a fishnetty pattern of eyeshadow that raccoons up her face.2016, Robert J[ason] Peterson, “Booker, Glenn”, in Omegaball, Los Angeles, Calif.: A California Coldblood Book, Rare Bird Books, →ISBN…. From the entry fishnetty
  • He has pale hair and freckles, the Ron Weasley of local policing.2016, Susie Steiner, Missing, Presumed, Random House Publishing Group. From the entry Ron Weasley
  • She was pale, tachypnoeic and required CPAP ventilation with up to 60% oxygen.2015 July 30, Sarah C. Grünert et al., “Medium-chain acyl-CoA dehydrogenase deficiency associated with a novel splice mutation in the…. From the entry tachypnoeic
  • I'm livid; a deathly pale light floods my face and I emanate a different smell.2014, Francesco Verso, Livid, Surry Hills, N.S.W.: Xoum Publishing, →ISBN. From the entry livid
  • He paled in comparison to the eight foot tall Deimosian female.2013 August 2, Nathan Skaggs, The Onslaught, →ISBN. From the entry Deimosian

Meaning of pale

  1. adjective Light in color.
  2. adjective Having a pallor (a light color, especially due to sickness, shock, fright etc.).
  3. adjective Feeble, faint.

Full definition of pale

Questions about pale in a sentence

How do you use pale in a sentence?
Pale is used as an adjective, verb and noun. For example: “I have pale yellow wallpaper.”
What is a short sentence with pale?
“I have pale yellow wallpaper.”
What does pale mean?
Pale means light in color.

Source and license

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