Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use purportedly in a sentence

14 example sentences · adverb

Purportedly means as appears to be true or is stated or accepted to be (though might not be so). Example: “In addition, none of the purportedly more common terms of these pairs appear to be especially frequent in modern Indian English.”

Examples of purportedly by meaning

adverbAs appears to be true or is stated or accepted to be (though might not be so).

  • In addition, none of the purportedly more common terms of these pairs appear to be especially frequent in modern Indian English.2014, James Lambert, “Diachronic stability in Indian English lexis”, in World Englishes, page 120
  • Australia is working to verify the authenticity of a video that purportedly shows one of its nationals captured by Russian forces while fighting in Ukraine.2024 December 23, Hilary Whiteman, “Australia investigates video purportedly showing national captured by Russian forces in Ukraine”, in CNN

More sentences with purportedly

  • Antisemitic rhetoric specifically targets Jews; anti-Jewish rhetoric instead targets all who bear purportedly Jewish characteristics, especially non-Jews.2023 October 1, David M. Freidenreich, Jewish Muslims: How Christians Imagined Islam as the Enemy, Oakland, California: University of…. From the entry anti-Judaism
  • The Vatican on Sunday publicly unveiled a handful of bone fragments purportedly belonging to St.2013 November 24, “Vatican displays bones purportedly belonging to St. Peter, the first pope”, in The Washington Post, Washington, D.C.…. From the entry St. Peter
  • In their quest, they've amassed an exhaustive list of substances that purportedly have aphrodisiac properties.2003, Hilda Hutcherson, “Sexual Enhancers”, in What Your Mother Never Told You about Sex, Perigee, →ISBN, pages 169–170. From the entry aphrodisiac
  • While purportedly forward-looking, this approach is profoundly presentist and placeless.2018, Patrick J. Deneen, Why Liberalism Failed, New Haven: Yale University Press, →ISBN, page 70. From the entry presentist
  • Their grown-up troubles form an odd angle with the purportedly innocent feel-goodery, and ultimately betray the film's cross purposes.2018 December 12, Charles Bramesco, “A Spoonful of Nostalgia Helps the Calculated Mary Poppins Returns Go Down”, in The A.V. Club…. From the entry feel-goodery
  • Xi to images of the pudgy bear) and another of the Obama family purportedly watching the parade on television.2015 September 3, Patrick Boehler, “Trending on Chinese Social Media: Xi’s Salute, an Autocrat’s Son and Winnie the Pooh”, in The New York…. From the entry pudgy
  • American policy-makers reject the idea that a purportedly friendly, free market, democratic Japan could ever become a geopolitical rival.1995 November 20, Christopher Layne, “Be Prepared to Contain the Carthage of the 1990s […]”, in Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, Calif.…. From the entry policy-maker
  • Mock meats made from vegetable sources, purportedly first created by Buddhist vegetarians, are especially important to Chinese vegetarian cuisine, although they are now eaten worldwide.2013 June 4, “Mock Meats”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name). From the entry mock meat
  • When each spectator had purportedly become her mother, she was invited to share her mother's wisdom, prefaced by the words "I always said."2012, Jill Dolan, The Feminist Spectator as Critic, University of Michigan Press, →ISBN, page 94. From the entry reverential
  • Try to keep the testing time to a joysome minimum so that the people these holes are purportedly being designed for can play, too.2007, Melvin L. Silberman, The Handbook of Experiential Learning. From the entry joysome
  • All the elaborate, purportedly new, stunts are merely variations of four basic maneuvers: the leg-stand; the lay-down; the sit-up; and the whirl-around.1958, William Ballantine, Wild tigers & tame fleas. From the entry trickdom
  • Rumors abound of a ghost who haunts the third dining room, which purportedly was once a barber shop where a local mobster was cut down midshave.1998, Rebecca Poole Forée, Northern California Best Places: Restaurants, Lodgings, and Touring, Seattle, Wash.: Sasquatch Books, →ISBN…. From the entry midshave

Meaning of purportedly

  1. adverb As appears to be true or is stated or accepted to be (though might not be so).

Full definition of purportedly

Questions about purportedly in a sentence

How do you use purportedly in a sentence?
Purportedly is used as an adverb. For example: “In addition, none of the purportedly more common terms of these pairs appear to be especially frequent in modern Indian English.”
What is a short sentence with purportedly?
“While purportedly forward-looking, this approach is profoundly presentist and placeless.”
What does purportedly mean?
Purportedly means as appears to be true or is stated or accepted to be (though might not be so).

Source and license

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