How to Use subsonic in a Sentence

subsonic

adjective
  • One group tried to build an app that could deter boars with subsonic sound waves.
    — New York Times, 9 Apr. 2021
  • At subsonic speeds, the airflow around the wings, tail, and fuselage is smooth.
    — Jacek Krywko, Ars Technica, 29 Mar. 2024
  • Most dogfights these days are done at subsonic speeds and at low altitudes.
    — Kevin Brown, Popular Mechanics, 19 Nov. 2020
  • This generates enough thrust to drive an aircraft at subsonic speeds.
    — Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 7 Aug. 2020
  • The Concorde’s fares were about 30% more than subsonic first class fares.
    — Jennifer Alsever, Fortune, 18 Sep. 2021
  • All four competitors have developed subsonic jet drones in the past.
    — Sean Gallagher, Ars Technica, 6 Oct. 2020
  • The second set of pilot and main parachutes, which are larger, are deployed at subsonic speeds.
    — Eric Berger, Ars Technica, 25 Feb. 2020
  • Scholl said Overture’s gull wings will be shaped for both supersonic and subsonic flight modes.
    — Michael Verdon, Robb Report, 26 June 2023
  • For the most part, that’s subsonic flight within Earth’s atmosphere.
    — Caroline Delbert, Popular Mechanics, 2 Dec. 2020
  • Kalibr is a subsonic cruise missile used against targets in Syria.
    — Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 30 Apr. 2021
  • The missile operates at high-subsonic speed and uses a fire-and-forget system.
    — Aamir Khollam, Interesting Engineering, 31 Mar. 2026
  • Ukraine’s Neptune is a subsonic anti-ship missile with a range of about 175 miles.
    — Michael Peck, Forbes, 6 May 2022
  • Once in the lower atmosphere and with speeds now in the subsonic realm, parachutes were deployed to further slow the capsule.
    — David Szondy, New Atlas, 6 Sep. 2024
  • The Tomahawk is a subsonic cruise missile with a range up to around 1,500 miles.
    — Shane Croucher, MSNBC Newsweek, 14 Oct. 2025
  • In particular, the shape of the weapon looks much like a conventional subsonic cruise missile.
    — Geoff Brumfiel, NPR, 18 June 2026
  • Scholl said Boom will reduce costs by designing an entirely new engine rather than tweaking one made for subsonic flight.
    — David Koenig, Orlando Sentinel, 13 Dec. 2022
  • At subsonic speeds, the airflow over an airframe consists of relatively smooth, though complex, streams.
    — David Szondy june 04, New Atlas, 4 June 2026
  • This makes it, as well as subsonic cruise missiles, a major threat to military installations across Guam.
    — Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 29 Aug. 2022
  • Boom predicts that the Overture will be able to serve more than 600 routes around the world in about half the time of subsonic commercial jets.
    — Michael Verdon, Robb Report, 27 Nov. 2023
  • This would give the subsonic attack jet the range to strike distant targets, perhaps bombing enemy air defenses to allow manned jets to slip through.
    — Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 5 June 2019
  • In the same way, the air conditioning system has to heat the interior at subsonic speeds and then cool it after Mach 1 is passed.
    — J. A. Maxtone Graham, Popular Mechanics, 24 Sep. 2020
  • The previous record was held by a Norwegian Air flight that made the subsonic trip in 5 hours and 13 minutes.
    — Madison Dibble, Washington Examiner, 10 Feb. 2020
  • The house was littered with casings from subsonic ammunition of the same brand recovered from the motel room, Avila said.
    — Matthew Ormseth, Los Angeles Times, 5 Dec. 2023
  • And so, the lower ends are usually taken by mammals, from the subsonic utterances of giraffes, elephants and hippos to the sounds of monkeys and cats.
    — Peter Hemminger, Longreads, 3 Mar. 2022
  • The subsonic Kalibr, with its thousand-pound warhead and range of a thousand miles or more, is indicative of this modernization.
    — David Axe, Forbes, 19 Jan. 2022
  • Critics have pointed out that subsonic, non-stealth aircraft like the Reaper could be easy targets for Chinese air defense systems in a near-peer war.
    — Alex Hollings, Popular Mechanics, 20 Sep. 2021
  • Many are subsonic, though some newer systems can be supersonic or hypersonic.
    — Atharva Gosavi, Interesting Engineering, 30 June 2026
  • The subsonic Hawks are the only fighters permanently based in the east, where the Chinese planes flew their provocative mission.
    — David Axe, Forbes, 27 Sep. 2021
  • Both missile versions are all-weather-capable, fire-and-forget solutions that travel just above the surface of the water at high-subsonic speed.
    — Prabhat Ranjan Mishra, Interesting Engineering, 11 Oct. 2025
  • The tricky bit is controlling the air intake, with a conical inner body that adjusts the shock waves and slows down the airflow to subsonic speeds, otherwise the engine would burst or melt.
    — David Szondy may 25, New Atlas, 25 May 2025

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