Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use surpass in a sentence

39 example sentences · verb

Surpass means to go beyond or exceed (something) in an adjudicative or literal sense. Example: “The former problem student surpassed his instructor's expectations and scored top marks on his examination.”

Examples of surpass by meaning

verbTo go beyond or exceed (something) in an adjudicative or literal sense.

  • The former problem student surpassed his instructor's expectations and scored top marks on his examination.
  • The heavy rains threatened to surpass the capabilities of the levee, endangering the town on the other side.
  • He celebrated at full-time with a beaming smile as he collected the match ball and he notched up another milestone by becoming the sixth Welshman to surpass 50 Premier League goals.2021 May 2, Emma Sanders, “Tottenham Hotspur 4-0 Sheffield United”, in BBC Sport

More sentences with surpass

  • His affluence was surpassed by no man.From the entry affluence
  • However, no tall tale or playground rumor has surpassed Herobrine, Minecrafts most infamous urban legend, in popularity.2024 July 24, Jack Peachey, “Minecraft’s Herobrine Creepypasta Explained”, in Game Rant. From the entry playground rumor
  • It’s surpassed memehood and become an artistic movement of its own.2023 March 19, Talia Felix, “Steaming a Good Ham”, in Online Etymology Dictionary, archived from the original on 20 Mar 2023. From the entry memehood
  • It’s the first time PDD has surpassed its older rival, according to data provider Refinitiv Eikon.2023 November 30, Michelle Toh and Laura He, “‘Pay any price.’ Alibaba’s Jack Ma urges reform as rival rattles e-commerce giant”, in CNN…. From the entry baba
  • Donovan's simple nylon diaper covers far surpassed rubber pants for one simple reasons—diaper rash.2022 April 12, Jack Challoner, editor, 1001 Inventions That Changed the World, Thunder Bay Press, →ISBN, page 645. From the entry rubber pants
  • The Finnishization of the East has surpassed even the dreams of the Greater Finland propagandists.2001, Jukka Siikala, Departures: How Societies Distribute Their People, →ISBN. From the entry Finnishization
  • Old Mudgy surpassed himself as a scowler and mumbler when engaged in the practice of his art.1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 91. From the entry mumbler
  • With a terrific reputation developed from last year it must surpass itself.1934 June 5, “World’s Greatest Carny: Chi Expo Opens Only 75% Ready […]”, in Variety, volume 114, number 12, New York, N.Y.: Variety…. From the entry headliney
  • Our singing strength surpasses anything known in the history of the command.1900 February, George De C. Curtis, The Seventh Regiment Gazette: An Illustrated Magazine Devoted to the Interests of the Seventh Regiment…. From the entry tickle the ivories
  • In fact, by some measures, the racial liberalism of white Democrats and liberals has even surpassed that of their non-white counterparts.2022 May 2, Zachary Goldberg, “Explaining Shifts in White Racial Liberalism: The Role of Collective Moral Emotions and Media Effects”, in…. From the entry racial
  • As an algorist Euler has never been surpassed, and probably never even closely approached, unless perhaps by Jacobi.2014, E.T. Bell, Men of Mathematics, page 140. From the entry algorist
  • Government under polysynody is the affair of human individuals, who through their own efforts create an entity that surpasses them.2006, Ellen M McClure, Sunspots and the Sun King, page 262. From the entry polysynody
  • Installation and configuration are the twin devils of computing, surpassed only by the messy demons of uninstallation and upgrade.2002 January 31, Ashley Dunn, “Simplicity Should Be the Mantra”, in Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, Calif.: Los Angeles Times…. From the entry uninstallation
  • Cyberocracy must surpass bureaucracy and its 20th-century iteration, technocracy if new techniques of acquiring and using information are to take hold.1992 December, David Ronfeldt, “Cyberocracy is coming”, in The Information Society, volume 8, number 4, →DOI, →ISSN, page 255. From the entry cyberocracy
  • Curling organic orange leather armchairs are superbly stylish and comfortable only surpassed by zoomorphic monoped wood and metal tables.1989, Design - Issues 487-492, page 43. From the entry monoped
  • Maturity of utterance and sophistication of expression combine in a swingeing, energetic exploration of his situation which he never surpassed.1987, John Baglow, “Uncouth Dilemmas”, in Hugh MacDiarmid: The Poetry of Self, Kingston, Ont.; Montreal, Que.: McGill-Queen's University…. From the entry swingeing
  • The first Grand Slam showpiece between the two dominant players on the ATP Tour had been a tantalising prospect - and it surpassed the hype.2025 June 8, Jonathan Jurejko, “Alcaraz stuns Sinner in extraordinary French Open final”, in BBC. From the entry hype
  • Companies seeking to raise capital through bond offerings may often be required to overcollateralize the bonds by pledging assets that surpass the bond’s face value.2024 January 28, Michael Taylor, “What Is Overcollateralized and How Does It Work?”, in Shifting Shares. From the entry overcollateralize
  • ExxonMobil (XOM), once the world’s most valuable company, was recently surpassed in market capitalization by wind and solar company NextEra Energy (NEE).2020 October 19, Matt Egan, “The oil industry is in crisis. ConocoPhillips is doubling down”, in CNN Business. From the entry XOM
  • Now there is another subject in which Donald Trump’s expert knowledge surpasses that of everybody else: wind turbines, though he calls them windmills.2019 December 24, Richard Luscombe, “‘I never understood wind’: Trump goes on bizarre tirade against wind turbines”, in The Guardian, →ISSN. From the entry wind turbine
  • Father narrated the story of how Canada developed over a short period to surpass other countries, including Britain, from which it had emerged.2015, Chigozie Obioma, The Fishermen, ONE, page 219. From the entry canada
  • But it's worth spending time on iTunes's specific design problems, which surpass those raised by managing a music library or listening to a specific genre.2015 July 29, Robinson Meyer, “Look Closely and iTunes Somehow Becomes Even Worse”, in James Bennet, editor, The Atlantic, Washington…. From the entry toxic hellstew
  • What he finds surpasses his expectations.2004, Robin [Jeremy] Brooks, “Third Fragment: Discovery”, in The Portland Vase: The Extraordinary Odyssey of a Mysterious Roman Treasure…. From the entry sarcophagus
  • “What does this cone have to do with your work?” Nora’s puzzled look revealed that Dad had just surpassed her in geekitude.2000 September, K[atherine] A[lice] Applegate, chapter 1, in The Revelation (An Apple Paperback), New York, N.Y.: Scholastic Inc., →ISBN…. From the entry geekitude
  • The river with the largest flow in the world is the Amazon which surpasses the Nile by 60 times its measley discharge.1991 November 14, “From Guinness”, in The Middlebury Campus, volume 90, number 9, Middlebury, Vt.: Middlebury College, page 7, column 4. From the entry measley
  • For areas also likely to surpass a high shaking threshold, wireless carriers are equipped to automatically send warnings to every phone using a similar emergency system to Amber Alerts.2022 November 14, Geoffrey A. Fowler, “America has an earthquake early-warning system now — on your phone”, in The Washington Post…. From the entry amber alert
  • That list includes Domo, Slack, Sprinklr, Shopify, and EventBrite, all of which have “unicorned,” or surpassed the billion-dollar valuation mark, in the past year or two.2015 April 30, John Koetsier, “29 martech unicorns: There are now almost 30 $1B+ marketing technology vendors”, in Venture Beat. From the entry unicorn
  • But after investing in better research and education, we didn't just surpass the Soviets; we unleashed a wave of innovation that created new industries and millions of new jobs.2011 January 5, Barack Obama; Jon Favreau, speechwriter, “Remarks by the President in State of Union Address”, in White House Office of…. From the entry sputnik
  • It also appears that the older with less education score initially better than the young with higher education, but over time, the young appear to surpass them.2008, Can Attachment Explain Individual Differences in Cognitive Functioning Over Time?: Results from a 12-year Cohort-sequential Study…. From the entry over time
  • Then, to the disappointment of the masses of people who wanted a posthumous whipping of Mao, the Teng & Co. declared that Mao's merits surpassed his demerits.1981 August 23, L. Chen, “Teng up there not respected”, in Free China Weekly, volume XXII, number 33, Taipei, page 3. From the entry de-Maoization
  • Passionate Love for Indian Music Khusrau had a great admiration for Indian music also, and exultatingly claimed that no music of any other country could surpass it.1975, Amīr Khusraw Dihlavī, Amir Khusrau: Memorial Volume, page 136. From the entry exultatingly
  • Although the literature of Puerto Rico far surpasses that of the Neo-Rican, or self-styled Rican, in the United States, the latter represents a continuity of the island heritage.1974 November, María Teresa Babín, “Introduction: The Path and the Voice”, in María Teresa Babín, Stan Steiner, editors, Borinquen: An…. From the entry Neo-Rican
  • The parents of certain African and Asian fishes show a sacrificial devotion to their young that must surely surpass the devotion of any other members of the animal kingdom.1968, Alan Mark Fletcher, “The Mouthbreeder”, in Unusual Aquarium Fishes, Philadelphia, Pa.; New York, N.Y.: J. B. Lippincott Company…. From the entry mouthbreeder
  • Nothing could surpass the nonsensity of trying to run so complex and so concentrated a machine by southern and western farmers in grotesque alliance with city day laborers.1918, Henry Adams, The Education of Henry Adams. From the entry nonsensity
  • The primacy of the mastectomy, with the objective of saving life, had been surpassed by the new quadrantectomy, which not only saved lives but also improved the quality of life.2013, Umberto Veronesi, The First Day Without Cancer: The Battles We Have Won, and Those We Will Win, Open Road Media, →ISBN. From the entry quadrantectomy
  • The number of Palestinians still being killed by Israelis is now surpassed by the number killed by other Palestinians as "collaborators" (the "intrafada," as one anonymous wag grimly tagged it).1991, David Pollock, “The American Response to the Intifada”, in Robert O[wen] Freedman, editor, The Intifada: Its Impact on Israel, the…. From the entry intrafada

Meaning of surpass

  1. verb To go beyond or exceed (something) in an adjudicative or literal sense.

Full definition of surpass

Questions about surpass in a sentence

How do you use surpass in a sentence?
Surpass is used as a verb. For example: “The former problem student surpassed his instructor's expectations and scored top marks on his examination.”
What is a short sentence with surpass?
“What he finds surpasses his expectations.”
What does surpass mean?
Surpass means to go beyond or exceed (something) in an adjudicative or literal sense.

Source and license

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