How to Use playa in a Sentence

playa

noun
  • So what caused the rocks to drag themselves across the playa?
    — Carl Engelking, Discover Magazine, 27 Aug. 2014
  • The playa needs to be firm enough for heavy trucks to drive on and airplanes to land on.
    — Jenny Kane, USA TODAY, 16 June 2017
  • The dust doesn’t come only from the Salton Sea playa.
    — Ian James, Los Angeles Times, 9 Apr. 2026
  • The playa is a source of dust that could worsen air pollution.
    — Evan Bush, NBC News, 18 Mar. 2023
  • There were maybe 5,000 people left on the playa at that point.
    — Anya Kamenetz, Curbed, 14 Sep. 2023
  • After dark, a group of us biked out to see the glowing art scattered around the playa.
    — Matthew Hutson, The New Yorker, 8 Sep. 2023
  • Elisabeth pointed across the playa at a swirling beige cloud that was coming our way.
    — Hazlitt, 1 Nov. 2023
  • Other art cars on the playa were newer, flashier, faster, outfitted with more lasers.
    — Katie Bain, Billboard, 16 Sep. 2021
  • Pay the fee and enjoy a soak under the stars after driving around on the playa — no speed limit.
    — oregonlive, 3 June 2021
  • Thursday night after Diplo’s set, news of rain clouded the playa glow.
    — Asli Pelit, Rolling Stone, 4 Sep. 2023
  • As a sign, perhaps, that things would be okay, a rainbow arched across the playa Saturday.
    — Dino Grandoni and Kim Bellware, Anchorage Daily News, 6 Sep. 2023
  • The youngest Burner ever made an exodus from the playa that will go down as one of the most talked-about.
    — Siobhan McAndrew, USA Today, 2 Sep. 2025
  • On Wednesday, the weather finally took a turn for the better, as the winds died down and the playa dried up.
    — Denver Nicks, Rolling Stone, 14 Sep. 2025
  • Patches of standing water on the playa made leaving the site close to impossible for many.
    — Alden Wicker, WIRED, 7 Sep. 2023
  • In the months after the Burn, a special restoration team sweeps the playa, raking any Moop out of the dust.
    — Alden Wicker, WIRED, 7 Sep. 2023
  • Resources are being marshaled to help those who made the expensive pilgrimage to the playa.
    — Elvia Limón, Los Angeles Times, 5 Sep. 2023
  • Within minutes, the cracks close up enough to severely limit any water passage through the playa.
    — John Richard Saylor, Discover Magazine, 18 Apr. 2021
  • About 12 miles east of Gerlach is the entry to the desert playa, where the pavement ends and the dust begins.
    — Jenny Kane, USA TODAY, 27 Aug. 2017
  • There were, however, others who stayed to lend a hand — the atrocious state of the playa notwithstanding.
    — Morena Duwe, Los Angeles Times, 10 Sep. 2023
  • The Panhandle is wetter than normal, leaving the region's playa lakes in good shape.
    — Shannon Tompkins, Houston Chronicle, 28 Oct. 2017
  • This begins by taking a right onto the playa at the 12-mile marker out on Route 34.
    — Katie Bain, Billboard, 10 Sep. 2021
  • These were in a place where the playa’s surface looked blank and archaeologists hadn’t documented any tracks.
    — Kiona N. Smith, Ars Technica, 4 Dec. 2019
  • At Burning Man, there are millions of lights that shine on the playa, but there are two that are perhaps the most important.
    — Jenny Kane, USA TODAY, 9 Sep. 2017
  • The dusty lake bed is susceptible to flooding, and excessive rain can turn the playa into a muddy expanse.
    — Denise Chow, NBC news, 25 Aug. 2025
  • The Black Rock Desert is also home to a popular site for land speed records, a place called the playa or alkali flats.
    — Caroline Delbert, Popular Mechanics, 7 Sep. 2023
  • The largest art piece on the playa was designed and constructed–inflated actually—by Ukraine.
    — Dennis Hinkamp, Denver Post, 23 Sep. 2025
  • Rain over the last 24 hours has created a situation that required a full stop of vehicle movement on the playa.
    — Trevor Hughes, USA TODAY, 2 Sep. 2023
  • The megadrought roiling the western United States is responsible for the rest of the deficit, which has left more playa to explore.
    — Evan Bush, NBC News, 7 Dec. 2022
  • And yet Burning Man is not sending any of its employees to the playa in an official capacity.
    — Katie Bain, Billboard, 10 Sep. 2021
  • Since 2020, the state has conducted pilot projects to reduce dust blowing off the playa, with promising early results.
    — Brent Haddad, The Conversation, 10 Jan. 2023

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