How to Use scattershot in a Sentence

scattershot

adjective
  • Some states aren't waiting, but the process can be scattershot.
    — Lindsay Whitehurst, Star Tribune, 13 Jan. 2021
  • If her projects seem scattershot, Hunt says that’s by design.
    — Erik Maza, Town & Country, 15 Nov. 2018
  • That scattershot revival had the wit to cast Sir Patrick way against type.
    — Darren Franich, EW.com, 23 Jan. 2020
  • Running through all of that makes for a long and somewhat scattershot keynote.
    — Dieter Bohn, The Verge, 8 June 2018
  • Some critics wrote it off as scattershot and uneven, laden with pop songs that were anything but sweet.
    — Chioma Nnadi, Vogue, 3 May 2018
  • This time, Valve’s approach is a bit more advanced—and a bit more scattershot.
    — Hayden Dingman, PCWorld, 11 July 2019
  • The album is a bit of a scattershot affair, jumping all over the hip-hop spectrum.
    — Luca Cimarusti, Chicago Reader, 20 Apr. 2018
  • Yet even the pleasure of the concert scenes remains scattershot.
    — Owen Gleiberman, Variety, 8 Feb. 2024
  • At the time, emergency medicine was a rather scattershot affair.
    — Mike Hughlett, Star Tribune, 27 Nov. 2020
  • Already, some in city government are trying to pull back from the scattershot tax method.
    — Gregory Barber, WIRED, 16 July 2019
  • The scattershot offense with no real rhythm or identity is still the same.
    — Dan Labbe, cleveland, 10 Nov. 2019
  • These ideas make for a solid foundation, even though the movie is often scattershot.
    — Siddhant Adlakha, Variety, 27 Jan. 2025
  • Higley’s office still holds boxes of papers with the five-pad imprint amid dark scattershot loose soot.
    — Elizabeth Miller, Smithsonian Magazine, 28 Mar. 2022
  • This isn’t the moment for a scattershot pilot approach.
    — Peter Bendor-Samuel, Forbes.com, 26 Aug. 2025
  • At the same time, the company’s approach to banning users has been scattershot.
    — Mike Isaac, New York Times, 5 Jan. 2018
  • There was some fear in his kitchen that their brand of hot food served out of a box would lead to scattershot negative reviews online.
    — Nick Rallo, Dallas News, 8 July 2020
  • The update's scattershot progress reports gave no indication that any of that has been done.
    — John Timmer, Ars Technica, 1 Dec. 2022
  • Without a clear sense of purpose, Crash feels a bit scattershot as Kehlani turns up the heat and racks up the jams.
    — Mosi Reeves, Rolling Stone, 21 June 2024
  • His pocket awareness still needs work, though, and the occasional scattershot stretch pops up from time to time.
    — Eddie Brown, San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 Apr. 2026
  • Some hospitals have started to run their own numbers, but the effort is scattershot.
    — Duaa Eldeib, CNN Money, 8 May 2026
  • Some hospitals have started to run their own numbers, but the effort is scattershot.
    — Lee Hutchinson, ArsTechnica, 6 May 2026
  • Musk learned the hard way that scattershot employment practices don’t fly in Europe.
    — Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 1 Dec. 2022
  • There was no help from Odubel Herrera, who trudged through another scattershot game.
    — Matt Gelb, Philly.com, 25 June 2017
  • The system can be confusing for providers and results in enforcement that can feel scattershot and slow.
    — Lindsay Gellman, Wired, 17 Nov. 2021
  • The same goes for its scattershot comedy, which ranges from the perversely dark to the frankly juvenile.
    — Guy Lodge, Variety, 21 May 2024
  • In states where more students took the choice to enroll in nonpublic schools, though, the results have been fairly scattershot.
    — Philip Bump, Washington Post, 12 Mar. 2018
  • All of that points to an alarming lack of efficiency, and that starts with Bortles’s scattershot right arm.
    — Michael Beller, SI.com, 15 Aug. 2017
  • The sketch overall is a scattershot assortment of jokes, but the enthusiasm and star power go a long way with this one.
    — Omar L. Gallaga, Los Angeles Times, 22 Dec. 2024
  • In the hands of influencers, they are fired at our timelines in a scattershot approach to attract a morsel of attention.
    — Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic, 21 Aug. 2024
  • Adding to the second-guessing about who should be getting shots is the scattershot feel of the rollout, and the sense that some might be gaming the system.
    — Candice Choi, chicagotribune.com, 8 Mar. 2021

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