How to Use happen in a Sentence

happen

verb
  • Something like that was bound to happen sooner or later.
  • What happened at school today?
  • You never know what's going to happen when they get together.
  • What happened that day at the lake?
    — Literary Hub, 11 June 2026
  • Oh my god, how did this happen vibe.
    — Madeline Hirsch, InStyle, 9 Jan. 2026
  • The same thing happens with goals.
    — Big Think, 11 Sep. 2025
  • That's not the way my life happened.
    — Christina Dugan Ramirez, FOXNews.com, 1 Sep. 2025
  • That might not happen 'til next year.
    — Mary Cunningham, CBS News, 22 Apr. 2026
  • There are too many things that could happen.
    — Rob Stein, NPR, 4 Mar. 2026
  • Hot car deaths can happen at any time of year.
    — Janet Loehrke, USA Today, 25 June 2026
  • What will happen next with gas prices?
    — Trevor Hughes, USA Today, 4 Mar. 2026
  • The fear that the same thing will happen again.
    — Jd Barker, Rolling Stone, 25 Mar. 2026
  • Weird stuff happens in the woods.
    — Josh Honeycutt, Outdoor Life, 30 Oct. 2025
  • And this doesn’t happen by chance.
    — Haniya Rae, Forbes.com, 18 Sep. 2025
  • My wife doesn’t know this happened.
    — Andy Mitten, New York Times, 21 May 2026
  • Think about what’s happened since then.
    — James Duesterberg, New Yorker, 18 Feb. 2026
  • And that didn't happen, and that was too bad.
    — Wesley Stenzel, Entertainment Weekly, 22 Jan. 2026
  • But that hasn’t happened this time.
    — Wendi C. Thomas, ProPublica, 15 Apr. 2026
  • This scene happens in both the book and the movie.
    — Ashley Boucher, Entertainment Weekly, 9 Jan. 2026
  • That stuff happened, of course.
    — Tyler Estep, AJC.com, 1 Apr. 2026
  • Which deals could still happen?
    — Leon Imber, New York Times, 1 Sep. 2025
  • This has happened three times in the past two months.
    — Jacobina Martin, Washington Post, 17 June 2026
  • The two didn’t talk much about the specifics of what happened.
    — Laura Bauer, Kansas City Star, 6 May 2026
  • And when that happened, that was when the scenes were the best.
    — Gerrad Hall, EW.com, 17 May 2023
  • The show doesn’t just happen in front of them, but around them.
    — Charna Flam, People.com, 8 Aug. 2025
  • This was the third time this has happened in the past two months.
    — Judith Martin, Mercury News, 17 June 2026
  • That's not what would happen on the moon, since there's no air.
    — Wired, 31 July 2022
  • When bad things happen, our guys are ready to step up to make a play.
    — George Henry, ajc, 1 Nov. 2022
  • When bad things happen, our guys are ready to step up and make a play.
    — oregonlive, 30 Oct. 2022
  • No one knows what is going to happen.
    — Erik Sherman, Forbes.com, 29 Jan. 2026

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