How to use what in a sentence
40 example sentences · determiner, pronoun, adverb
What means which, especially which of an open-ended set of possibilities. Example: “What colour are you going to use?”
Examples of what by meaning
determinerWhich, especially which of an open-ended set of possibilities.
- What colour are you going to use?
- What time is it?
- What kind of car is that?
determinerWhich.
- I wonder what colour he is going to use.
- I know what colour I am going to use.
- That depends on what answer is received.
determinerAny ... that; all ... that; whatever.
- He seems to have lost what sense he had.
- What money I earn is soon spent.
determinerEmphasises that something is noteworthy or remarkable in quality or degree, in either a good or bad way; may be used in...
- This shows what beauty there is in nature.
- You know what nonsense she talks.
- I found out what a liar he is.
determinerUsed to form exclamations indicating that something is remarkable, in either a good or bad way.
- Wow! What a speech.
- What beautiful children you have.
- With what passion she sings!
pronounWhich thing, event, circumstance, etc.: used in asking for the specification of an identity, quantity, quality, etc.
- Hammer in that nail —What with? I didn't bring my set of tools.
- What is your name?
- My kids set the neighbor's cat on fire. —They did what?
pronounThat which; those that; the thing(s) that.
- He knows what he wants and what to do to get it.
- What is amazing is his boundless energy.
- And, what's even worse, I have to work on Sunday too.
pronounAnything that; all that; whatever.
- I will do what I can to help you.
- What I'll do is, I'll phone you to let you know.
- What is mine is yours.
More sentences with what
- In a democratic world you'd be able to say what you thought wherever you were.From the entry able
- The youth of today have never known what life is like without a cell phone.From the entry today
- Did you hear what she said about my outfit? She kind of clocked me.From the entry clock
- What are the most important metrics to track for your business?From the entry metric
- What is the understanding of marriage and family in orthodox Marxist doctrine?From the entry doctrine
- Things around here are just a little more country than what he's used to.From the entry country
- I don't know what it is, but this music really sends me.From the entry send
- What kind of drink would you like? We have soft drinks and hard drinks.From the entry drink
- What she said about me was total bunk. Don't believe a word.From the entry bunk
- He might get cancer, or be hit by a bus, or God knows what.From the entry or
- Don’t just talk at someone; really listen to what they have to say.From the entry at
- Precisely to get away from you was why I did what I did.From the entry to
- Once arrested, I realized that handcuffs are concrete, even if my concept of what is legal wasn't.From the entry concrete
- The verbs in sentences like "Do it!" and "Say what you like!" are in the imperative.From the entry imperative
- We got into a silly quarrel about what food to order.From the entry quarrel
- She was offered various pieces of advice on what to do.From the entry advice
- Listen, brother, I don't know what you want, but I’m not interested.From the entry brother
Meaning of what
- determiner Which, especially which of an open-ended set of possibilities.
- determiner Which.
- determiner Any ... that; all ... that; whatever.
Questions about what in a sentence
- How do you use what in a sentence?
- What is used as a determiner, pronoun and adverb. For example: “What colour are you going to use?”
- What is a short sentence with what?
- “What is your name?”
- What does what mean?
- What means which, especially which of an open-ended set of possibilities.
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: what (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 what in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/what. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.