How to Use annihilate in a Sentence

annihilate

verb
  • He annihilated his opponent in the last election.
  • The enemy troops were annihilated.
  • But the fire in you to just switch it on and annihilate teams is what sets you apart.
    — Charlotte Harpur, New York Times, 27 July 2025
  • Dreams blend and bend time; death annihilates it, and Miller’s play is both.
    — Sara Holdren, Vulture, 10 Apr. 2026
  • To put that in context, each would be enough to annihilate anything in one to two city blocks.
    — chicagotribune.com, 8 Sep. 2017
  • Black holes are massive beasts that annihilate anything that dares to cross them.
    — Amber Jorgenson, Discover Magazine, 9 Jan. 2019
  • The love winging around the room scares her with its annihilating force.
    — Karen Russell, The New Yorker, 4 June 2017
  • Just as the robot is about to annihilate the boy, the titular hero flys in saves the day.
    — Patrick Cooley, cleveland.com, 26 June 2017
  • The grief and guilt annihilated our worth.
    — Jennifer W. Tsai, STAT, 18 Jan. 2026
  • What kind of school-annihilating hardware might be available by the time this virus came full-blown?
    — Mark Jacobson, Daily Intelligencer, 30 June 2017
  • Of course, this is the sort of view that, taken to its logical end, can annihilate the meaning of any event.
    — Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, 19 Feb. 2024
  • At the sound of the sixth trumpet, two hundred million horsemen annihilate a third of mankind.
    — Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker, 9 Aug. 2021
  • At last, fate affords Tár the chance to annihilate herself in the service of her art.
    — Becca Rothfeld, Vulture, 31 Jan. 2023
  • Or the leaders may clash and revert to threats to annihilate each other’s country.
    — Fortune, 14 Mar. 2018
  • But that doesn’t mean we never get stuck in the dark corners of our pasts, tempting our regrets to rise up and annihilate us.
    — Judy Berman, Time, 5 May 2026
  • Release the hostages and lay down your weapons—or Gaza will be destroyed, and you will be annihilated.
    — Amira El-Fekki‎, MSNBC Newsweek, 8 Sep. 2025
  • But for Kendrick to annihilate a name that big and then write a song that became a huge hit and then perform at halftime?
    — Melissa Ruggieri, USA Today, 22 May 2025
  • Keep from being annihilated inside and there was a way for Kansas to do it.
    — Sam Mellinger, kansascity, 3 Apr. 2018
  • For years, the actress, has been known to annihilate the red carpet in either sultry or glamorous looks.
    — Robyn Mowatt, Essence, 30 July 2024
  • The rift between the haves and have-nots is growing, and there seems to be a growing trend to annihilate people of color.
    — Harriette Cole, Mercury News, 4 July 2026
  • To kill the Jews, and to annihilate the Jewish state and come after us, drive us out of the region.
    — NBC news, 1 Mar. 2026
  • The mobile home was annihilated, and the Hawkins’ bodies were found a few hundred feet away from where the home once stood.
    — Joe Mario Pedersen, orlandosentinel.com, 13 Aug. 2019
  • Mary is willing to be annihilated and remade.
    — Mitch Therieau, New Yorker, 17 Apr. 2026
  • The photon pair cannot annihilate each other again and pay back their energy to the vacuum that surrounds the black hole.
    — Christoph Adami, Newsweek, 19 Mar. 2018
  • The main story is one of a city seemingly annihilating itself.
    — Meghan Daum, The Atlantic, 15 May 2026
  • The boardwalk was annihilated up and down the peninsula, crushed into pieces and twisted up like a wooden snake.
    — Curbed Editors, Curbed, 23 June 2026
  • Her anger stems from a catastrophic event that annihilated the clan's homeland.
    — Allison Degrushe, Entertainment Weekly, 16 Dec. 2025
  • You were supposed to be annihilated.
    — Lesley Stahl, CBS News, 16 Feb. 2026
  • How is annihilating the world a good defensive measure?
    — Zac Ntim, Deadline, 2 Sep. 2025
  • The Bay tells the (fake) story of a seaside town that was annihilated by a parasite and the coverup that followed.
    — Samantha Olson, Seventeen, 14 June 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'annihilate.' 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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