Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use search in a sentence

40 example sentences · noun, verb

Search means an attempt to find something. Example: “With only five minutes until we were meant to leave, the search for the keys started in earnest.”

Examples of search by meaning

nounAn attempt to find something.

  • With only five minutes until we were meant to leave, the search for the keys started in earnest.
  • At least eight people died, and officials expressed deep concerns that the toll would rise as more searches of homes were carried out.2012 October 31, David M. Halbfinger, New York Times, retrieved 31 Oct 2012

nounThe act of searching in general.

  • Search is a hard problem for computers to solve efficiently.
  • Perhaps we assume that our name, address and search preferences will be viewed by some unseen pair of corporate eyes, probably not human, and don't mind that much.2013 June 14, Jonathan Freedland, “Obama's once hip brand is now tainted”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 1, page 18

verbTo look in (a place) for something.

  • I searched the garden for the keys and found them in the vegetable patch.

verbTo look thoroughly.

  • The police are searching for evidence in his flat.
  • It is hardly surprising that pension funds, insurers and endowments are searching for new sources of return.2013 July 6, “The rise of smart beta”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8843, page 68

verbTo put a phrase into a search engine, especially one besides Google.

  • I searched "Paris Hilton" and found lots of unflattering stories.

More sentences with search

  • The shop wasn't giving me enough hours so I started searching for a second job.From the entry hour
  • New space telescopes may accelerate the search for other earths that may be out there.From the entry earth
  • The director searched their talent pool to fill the new opening.From the entry talent
  • My site received twice as many hits after being listed in a search engine.From the entry hit
  • I'm clean, officer. You can go ahead and search me if you want.From the entry clean
  • Having sated her appetite, she went off in search of a place to sleep.From the entry go off
  • Junk piled on the floor as we searched the attic for the old photograph albums.From the entry pile
  • I embarked on a trawl through my uncle's papers in search of his missing will.From the entry trawl
  • I went searching for a knife, but the kitchen was devoid of anything sharper than a spoon.From the entry devoid
  • Cigarette in mouth, he clutched his pockets in search of a lighter.From the entry lighter
  • That metadata makes it much easier for the search engine to crunch the data for queries.From the entry crunch
  • Sally was put in temporary charge of the department while they searched for a full-time replacement.From the entry temporary
  • The dog sniffed around the park, searching for a nice scent.From the entry sniff
  • A garbologist forages through waste paper baskets in search of interesting documents.From the entry garbologist
  • Traveling by air gives security officials implied consent to search your bags.From the entry implied consent
  • I searched for my glasses for twenty minutes, and finally found them right under my nose.From the entry under someone's nose
  • After a brief and unsuccessful search, he decided it was time to start pounding the pavement.From the entry pound the pavement
  • The police came and searched us at their discretion because we were shouting at each other's faces.From the entry discretion
  • A short Internet search brought up some amazing details of this story.From the entry bring up
  • The police carried out a microscopic search of the crime scene.From the entry microscopic
  • His depersonalization causes a great deal of stress as he searches for an authentic personal identity.From the entry depersonalization
  • After four months, the police called off the search for the missing boy.From the entry call off
  • This software searches the directory and attempts to filetype all the files in it.From the entry filetype
  • He pulled out a well-thumbed dictionary and began searching for a translation.From the entry well-thumbed
  • Many people had looked but it was unusual to see these searches bearing fruit.From the entry bear fruit
  • The soldiers split up into smaller squadrons to search the building.From the entry split up
  • Let's both search the house for my wallet. If you find it, sing out.From the entry sing out
  • He searched high and low for the car keys, through every room in the house.From the entry high and low
  • After their daughter went missing, her parents sent out a search party after her.From the entry search party
  • It's important to make Web pages indexable if you want people to find them through search engines.From the entry indexable
  • The crawlable Web made accessible by search engines does not represent the total extent of the Internet.From the entry crawlable
  • There are multiple sets of matchers for various types of searches.From the entry matcher

Meaning of search

  1. noun An attempt to find something.
  2. noun The act of searching in general.
  3. verb To look in (a place) for something.

Full definition of search

Questions about search in a sentence

How do you use search in a sentence?
Search is used as a noun and verb. For example: “With only five minutes until we were meant to leave, the search for the keys started in earnest.”
What is a short sentence with search?
“The police are searching for evidence in his flat.”
What does search mean?
Search means an attempt to find something.

Source and license

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