Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use ragged in a sentence

40 example sentences · adjective

Ragged means in tatters, having the texture broken. Example: “Newspaper columns should never be set ragged.”

Examples of ragged by meaning

adjectiveIn tatters, having the texture broken.

  • a ragged coat
  • a ragged sail

adjectiveHarsh-sounding; having an unpleasant noise.

  • There was a ragged noise of bleating from the flock penned in a corner of the yard.1912, David Herbert Lawrence, chapter 12, in The Trespasser

adjectiveWearing tattered clothes.

  • a ragged person
  • She ran to the door and there beheld the ragged street urchin calmly playing his organ.1956 [1880], Johanna Spyri, Heidi, translation of original by Eileen Hall, page 84

adjectiveFaulty; lacking in skill, reliability, or organization.

  • Now I realize how ridiculous and almost impertinent it was to expect New Yorkers to accept such a ragged performance for they have always demanded the best and do not tolerate the second-rate."2010, Dall Wilson, Alice Nielsen and the Gayety of Nations, →ISBN, page 318
  • Allardyce's side had led at the break through a Carlton Cole strike but after Thomas Ince - son of former Hammers midfielder Paul - levelled shortly after the restart, the match became increasingly stretched and ragged.2012 May 19, Paul Fletcher, “Blackpool 1-2 West Ham”, in BBC Sport
  • Despite the apparent general viability of the AVF its ragged performance serves to motivate serious questions concerning its future viability, the quality of the defense that we are buying, and the AVF's effect on our nation and society.2013, William J. Taylor, Eric T. Olson, Richard A. Schrader, Defense Manpower Planning: Issues for the 1980s, →ISBN, page 219

adjectiveOf a data structure: having uneven levels.

  • a ragged hierarchy
  • a ragged array, consisting of a number of arrays of varying size

adjectiveNot justified; having an uneven vertical margin.

  • Newspaper columns should never be set ragged.

More sentences with ragged

  • The harsh desert wind and sand had chewed the stump into ragged strips of wood.From the entry chew
  • They’ve been running him ragged trying to keep up with the demand for new features.From the entry run someone ragged
  • They walk on the tips of their long feet and have thick ragged wolf tails.2014, Heather Gunn, Aspect Core Rulebook FC 2015 SC, →ISBN, page 41. From the entry wolfkin
  • Her grandmother’s teadress is purple and green, ragged along the hem.2011, Ruth Sorrell, “Counterbalance”, in JoSelle Vanderhooft, Catherine Lundoff, editors, Hellebore & Rue: Tales of Queer Women and Magic…. From the entry teadress
  • Ragged embers, horn of an anvil, hovering bellows, a tongs of function and capernosity.2008, Tom MacIntyre, Find the Lady, page 18. From the entry capernosity
  • Another ragged, working-class suburb that had become bohemian and then been discovered and slicked up.2006, Kate Holden, In My Skin: A Memoir of Addiction, page 130. From the entry scunge
  • He was dressed casually, expensively, a contrast to his older brother's ragged, threadbare clothes and general scraggliness.2004, Carla Neggers, White Hot, →ISBN, page 195. From the entry scraggliness
  • The ragged edge so produced was then cleaned up with the grozing-iron.1952, L. F. Salzman, Building in England, page 179. From the entry grozing iron
  • Beside the window the enormous bed was made up, with ragged blankets and a coverless bolster.1949 June 8, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], “Chapter 4”, in Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel, London: Secker & Warburg, →OCLC…. From the entry coverless
  • Outside the town, three ragged children salaamed the Governor from the back of a camel.1937, Robert Byron, The Road to Oxiana, London: Macmillan, page 165. From the entry salaam
  • There were the Rougiers, for instance, an old, ragged, dwarfish couple who plied an extraordinary trade.1933 January 9, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], chapter I, in Down and Out in Paris and London, London: Victor Gollancz […]…. From the entry dwarfish
  • Towards them toiled with shuffling gait two ragged wanderers, becindered and begrimed.1921, George Randolph Chester, Lillian Chester, The Son of Wallingford, page 75. From the entry becindered
  • Ragged children played in the road, and an old barrel-organ was grinding out a vulgar tune.1915, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, chapter LXXXIII, in Of Human Bondage, New York, N.Y.: George H[enry] Doran Company, →OCLC. From the entry barrel organ
  • Ransacking the drawers of the dresser he came upon a discarded, tiny, ragged handkerchief.1906 April, O. Henry [pseudonym; William Sydney Porter], “The Furnished Room”, in The Four Million, New York, N.Y.: McClure, Phillips &…. From the entry heliotrope
  • A red-handed cleaning lady slopped a wet, ragged mop.2014, Rosa Liksom, Compartment - Issue 6, →ISBN. From the entry red-handed
  • The ragged men thumbed their noses at the limousine.2014, Joyce Van Haren, On Woodward, Abbott Press, →ISBN, page 114. From the entry Hoover flag
  • Down below, a ragged line of wolves ran silently, in single file, following a deer trail through the salal.2013, Ruth Ozeki, A Tale for the Time Being, Canongate Books (2019), page 186. From the entry salal
  • The increase in tourists are running us ragged.2012, Kathryn Meyer Griffith, chapter 17, in Dinosaur Lake, [Scotts Valley, Calif.]: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, →ISBN…. From the entry run someone ragged
  • Tony stared back at him, grinning as he saw the ragged scar that replaced the tip of one ear.2011 May 10, Freda Vasilopoulos, Past Tense, Belgrave House, →ISBN. From the entry Bagheera
  • She raised a pathetic handful of ragged bills.2005, John Connolly, The Black Angel: A Thriller, page 24. From the entry Mickey D's
  • I pulled on my smarmy t-shirt and my ragged jeans and dragged myself to report to my supervisor.2002 October, Austin Branstetter, "My day as a Carnie" Top of the Hill (Montgomery Bell Academy) Vol.8 No.1 p.4. From the entry smarmy
  • The rest of his ragged company remained seated, their heads low, staring at the earth, panting in the thin air.2001, William Deverell, The Laughing Falcon, page 142. From the entry swack
  • Either armed black men were coming to kill you, or white maddogs were tearing black children to ragged bits.1999, Reynolds Price, Roxanna Slade: A Novel, →ISBN, page 182. From the entry maddog
  • Such schedules frequently leave them ragged and unrested.1998 April 30, Bob Sculley, “Physician Deplores Medical Indifference To America's”, in Ludington Daily News, retrieved 18 May 2013. From the entry out on one's feet
  • I remembered the army of jobless and ragged men who rode grimy boxcars across our country during the Depression.1971, Lyndon Johnson, The Vantage Point, Holt, Reinhart & Winston, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 104. From the entry remember
  • He flung open the door, and found there only a ragged boy with a hurdy-gurdy on his back.1956 [1880], Johanna Spyri, Heidi, translation of original by Eileen Hall, page 83. From the entry hurdy-gurdy
  • A soft nose bullet would leave a ragged edge.1935 November 11, Clyde L. McNeil, witness, New York Life Insurance Company, Petitioner, vs. Stella Jane Gamer, as Executrix of the Will…. From the entry softnose
  • Bananas with their great ragged leaves, like the tattered habiliments of an empress in adversity, grew close up to the house.1919, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, chapter LII, in The Moon and Sixpence, [New York, N.Y.]: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers […], →OCLC. From the entry habiliment
  • All went unshaven, and many had long, filthy elf-locks hanging about their faces, and ragged beards reaching to their girdles.1904, Stanley J. Weyman, “XII. The Peasants' Camp”, in The Abbess of Vlaye. From the entry elflock

Meaning of ragged

  1. adjective In tatters, having the texture broken.
  2. adjective Having rough edges; jagged or uneven.
  3. adjective Harsh-sounding; having an unpleasant noise.

Full definition of ragged

Questions about ragged in a sentence

How do you use ragged in a sentence?
Ragged is used as an adjective. For example: “Newspaper columns should never be set ragged.”
What is a short sentence with ragged?
“a ragged coat”
What does ragged mean?
Ragged means in tatters, having the texture broken.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ragged (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:

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