How to Use sprawl in a Sentence

sprawl

1 of 2 verb
Definition of sprawlnext
Synonyms for sprawlnext
  • The city sprawls along the coastline.
  • The bushes were sprawling along the road.
  • She tripped and went sprawling into the table.
  • The kids sprawled on the floor to watch TV.
  • The elephant isn’t just in the room, it’s sprawled across both of your laps, singing show tunes.
    — Carolyn Hax, Washington Post, 27 Oct. 2023
  • The highlight of the design is the sprawling flybridge.
    — Rachel Cormack, Robb Report, 18 Dec. 2023
  • Jurors were shown images of her body sprawled out on the floor in a doorway.
    — Michael Ruiz, Fox News, 25 May 2023
  • The great room is undoubtedly the heart of the sprawling mansion.
    — Emma Reynolds, Robb Report, 7 Feb. 2024
  • The legs are thin, offering more space for people to sprawl out.
    — Paige Bennett, Better Homes & Gardens, 29 Nov. 2023
  • About two hours away from Salt Lake City, out in the sprawling desert, bands of wild mares and stallions roam free.
    — Jenna Rosenstein, Harper's BAZAAR, 8 Sep. 2023
  • The arachnid lies still, sprawled across the floor with one of its six legs pointed in each direction.
    — Ron Lieber, New York Times, 16 Dec. 2023
  • How to Get Around Eleuthera is a sprawling 110-mile island with a rural landscape.
    — Kristin Braswell, Travel + Leisure, 27 Jan. 2024
  • These are the best cold plunge tubs for any size space, sprawling mansion or cozy apartment, and for any size person.
    — Sean Evans, Robb Report, 9 Apr. 2024
  • The palatial pad sits on over five sprawling acres in Greenwich, tucked away on a private country lane.
    — Abby Montanez, Robb Report, 19 Oct. 2023
  • Jose Perez sprawled out on the court for a loose ball, corralling it and calling time put on what was crucial possession late.
    — Michelle Gardner, The Arizona Republic, 4 Jan. 2024
  • That sense of place applies to two principal settings as well as the sprawling space in between.
    — David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 15 Feb. 2024
  • But for those who like to stretch out, a rectangular shape offers more space lengthwise to sprawl.
    — Samantha S. Thorpe, Better Homes & Gardens, 6 Oct. 2023
  • In the snapshot the retired soccer star is sprawled on the ground beneath a large TV wearing nothing but a tight pair of white boxer briefs.
    — Hanna Lustig, Glamour, 15 Dec. 2023
  • Rosewood Bermuda is set on a sprawling, private stretch of pink-sand beach, the perfect spot to be marooned for a long weekend.
    — Stacey Leasca, Travel + Leisure, 17 May 2023
  • This level also features a sprawling terrace and a gym.
    — Emma Reynolds, Robb Report, 12 July 2023
  • Often there are only two deputies on a shift patrolling the county's sprawling 3,200 square miles, nearly twice the land mass of Rhode Island.
    — courier-journal.com, 31 May 2023
  • This isn’t the first time Stefani has featured her husband’s sprawling ranch on social media.
    — Meghan Overdeep, Southern Living, 3 Aug. 2023
  • Each will pull you into reading in a different way: Some are brief and succinct; others are long and sprawling.
    — Bekah Waalkes, The Atlantic, 7 Aug. 2023
  • Today, home is that tired apartment in a sprawling neighborhood near the city’s eastern border.
    — Andrew Brinker, BostonGlobe.com, 6 May 2023
  • Along the way, Kay will explore bustling cities and cantinas, race across sprawling outdoor landscapes on her speeder, and pilot her ship the Trailblazer through the wilds of space.
    — Todd Spangler, Variety, 9 Apr. 2024
  • Crews have been working to install a sprawling cover designed to suppress odors in the affected portion of the landfill.
    — Tony Briscoe, Los Angeles Times, 9 Feb. 2024
  • On Miles’ 30th birthday that July, the company flew him down to Austin, Texas — his first time on a private jet — and moved him into a sprawling ranch complex outside the city.
    — Avery Stone, The Hollywood Reporter, 9 Feb. 2024
  • My family is from Medellín, a sprawling city nestled in the Andes Mountains.
    — Isa Zapata, Bon Appétit, 3 Oct. 2023
  • But those disasters are hardly mistakes, and every drip, whoosh, splotch, and crinkle adds to the sprawling intrigue contained in each work.
    — Grace Edquist, Vogue, 13 Sep. 2023
  • Stark white and sprawled on a bluff, the Queen-Anne-style pile seemed like an apparition from a bygone era—a universe away from the drab prairie-hugging bungalows of my Chicago suburb.
    — Nina Molina, WSJ, 3 Aug. 2023
Advertisement

sprawl

2 of 2 noun
  • Just take the sprawl (and much of the risk of injury) out of the equation.
    — Jeff Tomko, Men's Health, 7 July 2022
  • So part of the book’s shape comes from wanting a sense of sprawl.
    — Hazlitt, 31 May 2023
  • The city is the densest core of a region known for sprawl.
    — Meris Lutz, ajc, 17 Aug. 2022
  • The Vanguard live set is more of a sprawl, its 11 tracks spread over two CDs.
    — Jon Garelick, BostonGlobe.com, 30 Aug. 2023
  • The massive sprawl of Game of Thrones could be both blessing and curse.
    — Alan Sepinwall, Rolling Stone, 19 Aug. 2022
  • The home has five bedrooms, six bathrooms, and sprawls over 1.5 acres of land.
    — Jennifer Nied, Women's Health, 3 Aug. 2023
  • On my last day in town, King takes me for a drive through the east end’s dismal sprawl.
    — Paul Solotaroff, Rolling Stone, 1 July 2023
  • For the most part, this campus is a sprawl of bunker-ish 1970s buildings.
    — Dirk Sutro, San Diego Union-Tribune, 25 June 2023
  • And unlike Chicago, the Texas sprawl requires a car to get around.
    — Kayla Hui, Chicago Tribune, 20 July 2023
  • The homes that are visible are scattered in what was, at the time, the northern edge of Phoenix sprawl.
    — Jake Frederico, The Arizona Republic, 26 July 2023
  • In has left me cold in any way, this sprawl is exactly why.
    — Roxana Hadadi, Vulture, 10 Oct. 2022
  • But conditions improve from that point, even with the unchecked sprawl.
    — Alan Sepinwall, Rolling Stone, 10 Mar. 2023
  • This can include jumps with weighted balls, sprawls, and Turkish get-ups.
    — Women's Health, 21 Feb. 2023
  • One family walked on a rickety pathway of boards over a sprawl of sticky black mud in their yard.
    — New York Times, 27 Apr. 2022
  • This abyssal plain sprawls over 2.3 million square miles, over half the size of the contiguous U.S., and plunges to depths exceeding 3 miles in some places.
    — Kate Golembiewski, Discover Magazine, 12 Dec. 2023
  • Pastures hold shorthorn cattle and horses, while hay fields sprawl to the pecan grove that lines the edge of the property.
    — Haeven Gibbons, Dallas News, 15 Aug. 2023
  • The restaurant is on Baldwin 181 on the southeast side of Fairhope, just south of a Walmart, just past the edge of the sprawl eating away at the pastoral Baldwin of old.
    — al, 6 Oct. 2022
  • Lush, green plants, each one watered every Wednesday, sprawl and stretch toward the sun.
    — Charisma Madarang, Los Angeles Times, 6 Aug. 2022
  • The show’s variety and sprawl was an occasional deficit, but this goes too far the other way.
    — Daniel Fienberg, The Hollywood Reporter, 19 Aug. 2022
  • As new immigrants chose to make their homes closer to the heart of the city, Leipzig’s suburban sprawl started to contract again.
    — WIRED, 15 Nov. 2022
  • Many Berlin artists have been pushed to the periphery, into less vaunted neighborhoods across the city’s 340-square-mile sprawl.
    — Jay Cheshes, WSJ, 29 Nov. 2022
  • The challenge for the uninitiated is to get beyond the glossy marketing, the perk sprawl and the sheer allure of spending, to weigh the benefits against the costs.
    — NBC News, 3 May 2022
  • Cate and Lathem refreshed half of the 3,000-square-foot sprawl, focusing on the dining room, living room, and bathroom.
    — Nafeesah Allen, House Beautiful, 21 May 2022
  • Once the Sunset Limited crosses the border into Texas, the sprawl of Houston looms on the horizon.
    — Evie Carrick, Travel + Leisure, 16 Mar. 2023
  • Finally, my account is set up and the sprawl of Erewhon’s bounty is at my fingertips.
    — Anusha Praturu, Vulture, 15 Dec. 2023
  • The sprawl still feels distant up Interstate 15 in Leeds, where there is no school and the only grocery store recently closed.
    — Karin Brulliard, Washington Post, 15 Aug. 2022
  • From country land to a suburban sprawl Richards has seen the area grow from farmland and a AA school to its current status as the biggest public school in the state.
    — Scott Springer, The Enquirer, 20 July 2022
  • As the summer of 1978 sprawls forward, and as the Red Sox rally, Marty gets revved by the possibility that this, at last, could be their year.
    — Owen Gleiberman, Variety, 12 June 2023
  • At other points, the sprawl of the world seemed to pull focus from the dynamic between its protagonists.
    — Alex Barasch, The New Yorker, 12 Mar. 2023
  • People come here and get lost in the sprawl, the never-ending concrete arteries, the loneliness.
    — Dave Schilling, Los Angeles Times, 2 June 2022

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'sprawl.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: