How to Use frighten in a Sentence

frighten

verb
  • The child was badly frightened by the mask.
  • The story really frightened me.
  • The agents turned on their lights briefly, which frightened the thief.
    — Mary Zahn and Bill Janz, Journal Sentinel, 17 Jan. 2024
  • Most people tend to avoid things that scare or frighten them.
    — Alex Orlando, Discover Magazine, 31 Oct. 2023
  • The king of the forest was once frightened by the sound of a bull.
    — John Nemec, The Conversation, 7 Apr. 2025
  • Grete is frightened of her brother, of course.
    — Christine Smallwood, Harpers Magazine, 24 Mar. 2026
  • We are drawn to the sea and frightened by it, and always have been.
    — Carl Hoffman, Washington Post, 1 Aug. 2023
  • But that’s part of the process — being frightened — for all of us.
    — Brande Victorian, The Hollywood Reporter, 19 Dec. 2023
  • Their firearms can be concealed to not scare those who are frightened by the sight of guns.
    — oregonlive, 26 Jan. 2023
  • What frightened me most was what might happen to my children.
    — Monica Rodriguez-Aguilera, New York Daily News, 15 June 2026
  • Many of us wear them as a courtesy, so as not to frighten others around us.
    — John Kass, chicagotribune.com, 11 Sep. 2020
  • Why does the thought of people freely speaking their minds frighten them so?
    — Hanna Krueger, NOLA.com, 10 Mar. 2018
  • But nothing could move Ahmed; there was a fury in him that frightened her.
    — Anand Gopal, The New Yorker, 11 Mar. 2024
  • That’s just frightening how much you guys have planned out that far in advance.
    — Jessica Radloff, Glamour, 15 Jan. 2019
  • The poor things are frightened by the loud, unpredictable booms.
    — Tribune Content Agency, The Mercury News, 4 Oct. 2024
  • Smoke from the fires blew across bays on the picturesque coast, frightening some.
    — Bloomberg.com, 26 July 2017
  • The leaflets frightened some students, and scared some of their parents.
    — Amelia Nierenberg, BostonGlobe.com, 25 Aug. 2023
  • Frightened by his outburst, Mangum and her friend moved to the back of the train.
    — Madison Park, CNN, 31 May 2017
  • In the making of a film, no animal should be frightened at all.
    — Megan Friedman, Country Living, 6 Feb. 2017
  • The woman was frightened and allowed Hunter to get in the back seat.
    — Karen Pilarski, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 17 July 2019
  • Lina sniffs, stamps her feet in the snow to make her own set of giant prints to frighten this creature.
    — Hazlitt, 8 Oct. 2025
  • No one would be killed, but the fires left this red county in a blue state both focused and frightened.
    — Randy Dotinga, The Christian Science Monitor, 13 July 2017
  • One day, the lion king was frightened by a roaring noise in the forest.
    — Salman Rushdie, The New Yorker, 31 Oct. 2023
  • But her outbursts frightened the children too.
    — Literary Hub, 16 June 2026
  • Stink bugs tend to drop when frightened, so fill a cup with soapy water and hold it under the stink bug.
    — Arricca Elin Sansone, Southern Living, 19 July 2025
  • The couple tried knocking on their door from the inside, to frighten it away.
    — Mark Price, charlotteobserver, 30 Mar. 2018
  • The man started stabbing the ground near the boy’s feet in an effort to frighten him.
    — Bob Sandrick, cleveland, 24 Sep. 2021
  • Others were concerned the puppies had been frightened by the lights and crowd.
    — Abigail Marsh, Washington Post, 20 Feb. 2018
  • Zhou was told that his wife, frightened of the procedure, had run away with the baby.
    — Barbara Demick, New Yorker, 23 May 2025
  • Most give up halfway, frightened by the warnings of those below.
    — Sudhir Gupta, Forbes.com, 11 Aug. 2025

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