Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use passive in a sentence

40 example sentences · adjective, noun

Passive means being subjected to an action without producing a reaction. Example: “He remained passive during the protest.”

Examples of passive by meaning

adjectiveTaking no action.

  • He remained passive during the protest.

adjectiveWithout motive power.

  • a passive balloon
  • a passive aeroplane
  • passive flight, such as gliding and soaring

adjectiveWhere allowance is made for a possible future event.

  • There would be a shuttle service of four trains an hour from Reading, where the rebuilt station also has passive provision for the trains.2021 May 5, Paul Clifton, “Network News: Heathrow Western Rail Access scheme 'on hold'”, in RAIL, number 930, page 26

nounA customer who is satisfied with a product or service, but not keen enough to promote it by word of mouth.

  • If you want to improve your organization's NPS, you need to follow up with your detractors, passives, and promoters to understand why they answered your question as they did and what you can do better in the future.2014, Roy Barnes, Bob Kelleher, Customer Experience For Dummies, page 266

More sentences with passive

  • Many languages, including English, use auxiliary verbs in constructing the passive voice.From the entry passive voice
  • Phrases such as officer-involved shooting are often criticized as examples of passive voice.From the entry passive voice
  • The verbal system of Latin has two voices, active and passive.From the entry voice
  • John's passive vocabulary seems to encompass most of the words in the Collegiate Dictionary!From the entry passive vocabulary
  • The perseverance of the saints is positive willedness, not mere passive willingness.From the entry willedness
  • The subject of a passive verb is usually a patient.From the entry patient
  • The dungeon fern has a passive attack that releases spores.From the entry passive attack
  • Every spring, the passive aggressive archbishop suffered from a brief flu that dispensed him from needing to provide Easter service to the king.From the entry dispense
  • She holds that passive index funds beat actively managed ones: she says that "set it and forget it," when done right, beats playing the market as a gambler.From the entry hold
  • He wanted to be a simple passive investor, but when the majority owner died and her widower made a mess of it, he had to take over.From the entry passive investor
  • Other support systems included active and passive sonar, altimeter, depthometer, and compass.2025 April 17, Wikipedia contributors, “CURV”, in English Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation. From the entry depthometer
  • Music is not simply a passive observer of the plastic age.2019, Kyle Devine, Decomposed: The Political Ecology of Music, page 100. From the entry petroculture
  • At the point where the passive stretching of a joint ends, the endfeel should be assessed.2016, Dennis Purcell, Minor Injuries: A Clinical Guide, →ISBN, page 80. From the entry endfeel
  • These built‐in features in the natural and man‐made environment are the passive tools of wayfinding.2015, Chris Calori, David Vanden-Eynden, Signage and Wayfinding Design. From the entry wayfinding
  • These antirotaviral antibodies are likely to provide a passive protection in the child ( 71 ).2015 August 19, Sara M. Parigi et al., “Breast Milk and Solid Food Shaping Intestinal Immunity”, in Frontiers in Immunology, volume 6, →DOI. From the entry antirotaviral
  • In this mechanometabolic scenario, a fibroblast is not a mere passive element.2015 August 19, Bruno Bordoni, Emiliano Zanier, “Understanding Fibroblasts in Order to Comprehend the Osteopathic Treatment of the…. From the entry mechanometabolic
  • Some doctors practiced passive eugenicide one newborn infant at a time.2013, Arthur L. Caplan, Robert Arp, Contemporary Debates in Bioethics, →ISBN. From the entry eugenicide
  • What significance should be applied to the apparent reversal of active human and passive animal?2012, Mel Y. Chen, Animacies: Biopolitics, Racial Mattering, and Queer Affect, →ISBN, page 146. From the entry templatically
  • ' Finally, repletive elements are also frequently employed in impersonal passives.2010, Anna Siewierska, Constituent Order in the Languages of Europe, page 94. From the entry repletive
  • This is not a cookbook full of passive recipes, nor is it a paint-by-numbers approach to teaching.2009, Diane Heacox, Rick Wormeli, Making Differentiation a Habit. From the entry paint-by-numbers
  • Where practicable, this passive measure reduces the consequences of a runaway.2008, Francis Stoessel, Thermal safety of chemical processes, page 257. From the entry runaway
  • A laissez-faire style, characterized by passive indifference about the task and subordinates, is essentially a nonstyle.2008, Montgomery Van Wart, Leadership in Public Organizations: An Introduction, page 274. From the entry nonstyle
  • At the Isle of Dogs there will be passive provision for a second ticket hall.2007 November 14, Great Britain: Parliament: Select Committee on the Crossrail Bill, Crossrail Bill: first special report, session…. From the entry passive provision
  • Users are no longer passive watchers on appointment TV with schedules fixed by TV stations.2002, Hari Om Srivastava, Interactive TV Technology and Markets, page 100. From the entry appointment TV
  • Punk zines wanted to make readers into music makers, zine publishers, and protesters rather than passive consumers.2001, Craig J Saper, Networked Art. From the entry punk zine
  • A decade ago, most union leaders saw such immigrants as passive, frightened and unorganizable.2001 February 2, Harold Henderson, “City File”, in Chicago Reader. From the entry unorganizable
  • You said it in a passive voice, as though others befriended you.1999, Jonathan Cole, “The Spectator”, in About Face (A Bradford Book), Cambridge, Mass.; London: The MIT Press, →ISBN, page 121. From the entry befriend
  • French indirect transitive verbs, i.e. verbs which take an indirect object, cannot be passive.1999, Monique L'Huillier, Advanced French Grammar, →ISBN, page 245. From the entry indirect transitive
  • In this new passive role, Jack putters with his own work while Beth organizes her desk.1998, Judith Kolberg, Conquering Chronic Disorganization, 2nd edition, Decatur: Squall Press, published 2006, →ISBN, page 108. From the entry body double
  • These can be called the Blaster (aggressive), the Shrinker (overly passive), or the Me (effective).1996, Maurice J. Elias with Steven E. Tobias, Social problem solving: interventions in the schools, page 49. From the entry shrinker
  • Unlike passive aggression and martyrdom, altruism allows the object to feel blessed and not afflicted.1995, George E. Vaillant, The Wisdom of the Ego, page 68. From the entry altruism
  • As the acquisition data show, learners seem to treat ergatives like passives.1994, Virginia Yip, “Grammatical Consciousness-raising and Learnability”, in Terence Odlin, editor, Perspectives on Pedagogical Grammar…. From the entry ergative
  • Nettlers are passive stingers.They include stinging plants, some are appropriately called nettles, jellyfish and some caterpillars.1992, F. Tom Turpin, The Insect Appreciation Digest, page 70. From the entry nettler
  • I want them to be passive (I'm totally non-violent) but open in feelings and ideas.1990 April 7, Roy Vance, “Personal advertisement”, in Gay Community News, page 18. From the entry morph

Meaning of passive

  1. adjective Being subjected to an action without producing a reaction.
  2. adjective Taking no action.
  3. adjective Being in the passive voice.

Full definition of passive

Questions about passive in a sentence

How do you use passive in a sentence?
Passive is used as an adjective and noun. For example: “He remained passive during the protest.”
What is a short sentence with passive?
“a passive aeroplane”
What does passive mean?
Passive means being subjected to an action without producing a reaction.

Source and license

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