How to Use pretend in a Sentence
- He pretended to make a phone call.
- The children pretended to be asleep.
- It was a mistake, and to pretend otherwise would be foolish.
- She looked like she was enjoying the party but she was just pretending.
- The children were pretending to be animals.
- He had a big stain on his shirt, but I pretended not to notice.
- Let's just pretend for a moment. I'm your boss. What would you say to me?
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In the first photo, a young Robert sits on his dad's lap and pretends to drive the old pick up truck.
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Tracey Harrington McCoy,
Peoplemag,
19 Apr. 2023
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A lot of people forget or pretend that MTV fell off in the ’90s.
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Chris Payne,
Vulture,
30 May 2023
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To pretend otherwise in the year 2024 is all-but to out oneself as a hireling.
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Charles C. W. Cooke,
National Review,
12 Feb. 2024
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And the Ginza, too, faked its whereabouts last fall, pretending to be off the coast of Oman.
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David Botti,
New York Times,
30 May 2023
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Lady went to the kitchen table and pretended to eat a sand- wich.
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Hazlitt,
14 June 2023
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The film revolves around a non-couple who have to pretend to be a couple?
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Emma Specter,
Vogue,
20 Oct. 2023
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The buoy, looking to connect with anything, pretends to be one so the satellite will stop and talk to it.
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Bilge Ebiri,
Vulture,
20 Jan. 2024
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Others want to take an adorable paw or floppy ear and pretend to eat it.
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Emilie Le Beau Lucchesi,
Discover Magazine,
21 Feb. 2024
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In his throwback post, Pauly D pretended to take a bite out of Polizzi’s arm.
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Zoey Lyttle,
Peoplemag,
23 Nov. 2023
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What Mercy is meant to do about it, Expats does not pretend to know.
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Angie Han,
The Hollywood Reporter,
25 Jan. 2024
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Instead of popping to his feet, Curry laid in the key and pretended to snooze.
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Connor Letourneau,
San Francisco Chronicle,
1 May 2023
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Don't go into gory detail, but don't pretend your child isn't aware that something's amiss in the world.
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Lisa Milbrand,
Parents,
26 Oct. 2023
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The media and people like me are just pretending there's a race going.
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Soo Rin Kim,
ABC News,
27 Nov. 2023
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Boring doesn’t sell, and the Yankees cannot even pretend to be pushing for a pennant.
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Tyler Kepner,
New York Times,
20 Aug. 2023
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Gomez — dressed in a chic white shirt and jeans — pretended to take a bite of the buttery treat, while Gracie looked less impressed.
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Jenny Haward,
Peoplemag,
23 June 2023
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James was sitting in a room for nine hours having to pretend to be reading a script, that is rare and that is special.
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Charna Flam,
Variety,
5 May 2023
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Wow, this woman straight-up pretends not to know her own granddaughter to save face.
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Emma Specter,
Vogue,
22 June 2023
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In the photos, Megan pretended to read a book and also posed in a doorway, all while her glass was firmly in hand.
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Kirsty Hatcher,
Peoplemag,
2 Oct. 2023
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In the home movie that still is pulled from, Bradford pretended to die after being shot.
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Ismail Muhammad,
New York Times,
19 Apr. 2023
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In short, no—including pretending to move to the Middle East.
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Radhika Seth,
Vogue,
1 Nov. 2023
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Now neither party wants a referee calling balls and strikes, or even to pretend that's the goal.
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Nbc Universal,
NBC News,
28 May 2023
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Maybe just pretend a little harder to have fun, next time, okay daddy-o?
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Kathleen Walsh,
Glamour,
13 Aug. 2023
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Hendry said the strategy of extending and pretending might be the wrong medicine for the current moment.
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Rachel Siegel,
Washington Post,
30 Mar. 2024
- The children played on a pretend train.
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That is the game, that all these things are fake, this is all pretend.
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The New Yorker,
29 May 2022
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It’s got a little sink and a pretend stove with pots and pans.
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Amy Dickinson,
Washington Post,
4 Dec. 2023
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In a movie version, the third-act reveal might be that your spouse, too, has a pretend job.
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Kwame Anthony Appiah,
New York Times,
11 Aug. 2023
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His mom even saved the picture from our pretend wedding.
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cleveland,
14 May 2022
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On this pretend trip-to-nowhere, maybe the 49ers could pick up a few healthy bodies to complete the fantasy.
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Ann Killion,
SFChronicle.com,
11 Oct. 2020
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The pretend band is what blew up and got him notoriety.
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Andy Greene,
Rolling Stone,
19 Nov. 2023
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The owners bribed people with HIV to serve as pretend patients.
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Jessica Wapner,
Scientific American,
15 Aug. 2023
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This is a pretty standard pick and roll, with a pretend screen from Rudy Gay at the beginning.
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The Salt Lake Tribune,
11 Dec. 2022
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Nick and Norah meet by chance at a club when Norah asks Nick to be her pretend boyfriend for five minutes.
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Leah Campano,
Seventeen,
14 Dec. 2022
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Milo passes through the tollbooth in his small pretend car and finds himself in the Lands Beyond.
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Emily Langer,
Washington Post,
9 Mar. 2021
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Using small fire hoses, children spray water on a fake fire to knock down pretend flames.
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John Benson,
cleveland,
7 Aug. 2023
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In a world so full of real horrors, the pretend ones offer escape and catharsis.
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Usa Today Staff,
USA TODAY,
27 Sep. 2021
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Prank-O has the Snack Hat, a pretend magnetic plate that lets kids eat while sitting on their dad’s shoulders.
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oregonlive,
7 June 2020
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Gather up toy shopping carts and cash registers, and let the kids turn the pantry, fridge and kitchen into a pretend grocery store.
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Amy Schwabe,
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel,
26 May 2021
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Wooden cars and a train with working wheels are also provided to be able to get around their pretend city.
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Ysolt Usigan,
Woman's Day,
18 Aug. 2022
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Inside the playhouse is a pretend kitchen that comes complete with a cordless phone, two pans, and a spatula.
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Ashley Ziegler,
Parents,
16 Oct. 2023
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The lagoon is indoors, edged with shells, rocks, little pools, palm trees and even its own pretend beach, set in a vaulted room three stories high.
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Judy Rose,
Detroit Free Press,
15 Aug. 2021
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The Law and Order franchise has been a guest-star pipeline of pretend offenders, victims and lawyers from off-Broadway and on for decades.
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Washington Post,
2 Feb. 2022
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From a pretend cruise at sea to music video-style pool parties, this isn't your average seniors' home.
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Zulekha Nathoo,
USA TODAY,
15 July 2022
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On the day of the pretend trip, White’s classroom transformed into an airplane, ready to welcome its young passengers.
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Jenna Wang,
Peoplemag,
22 Nov. 2023
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An hour later, Stonestreet stole his pretend husband's thunder and posted the same photo on his own feed — but with a few tweaks.
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Andrea Towers,
EW.com,
6 Jan. 2022
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At the center of the story is Arjie, a boy from a well-off Tamil family who would rather dress up as a bride for pretend weddings with the girls than play cricket with the boys.
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Los Angeles Times,
10 Dec. 2020
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The jig was up at the pretend quarterfinal stage when the police cracked down and arrested four persons involved with it.
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Ananya Bhattacharya,
Quartz,
11 July 2022
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After watching bakers twist dough in the classic shape, kids can try their hands at it using a pretend dough mixture.
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Karen Cicero,
Good Housekeeping,
20 Apr. 2022
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Your boyfriend, on the other hand, would like to create a narrative that’s a fiction, a pretend version of you, edited for his comfort.
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Lori Gottlieb,
The Atlantic,
5 Oct. 2020
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How could these missionaries not know: there is no foreign song in a pretend foreign song.
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Jordan Castro,
Harper's Magazine,
5 Jan. 2024
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Previous crafts included a pretend play pie, a pine cone turkey and a winter snow globe.
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Carol Kovach,
cleveland,
9 Dec. 2020
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Everyone assumed that people would have some fun playing around with a pretend currency for a year or two and then move on.
—
Timothy B. Lee,
Ars Technica,
8 Jan. 2018
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Here, roomy standing baskets (painted a stylish copper) function as a display for the pretend food used in the adorable play kitchen by Hello Baby Brown.
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Sienna Livermore,
House Beautiful,
31 May 2022
Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'pretend.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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