How to Use swill in a Sentence

swill

1 of 2 verb
  • He swilled the water around in the pot.
  • She watched the water swill around in the bucket.
  • He swilled the floor with buckets of water.
  • When the sun is blazing, beers are swilled on golf courses, boats and patios across the country.
    — Greg Trotter, chicagotribune.com, 24 May 2018
  • On a frigid evening in January, two homeless men sat on a bench downtown, swilling malt liquor.
    — Max Klaver, Miami Herald, 20 Mar. 2025
  • Comey-watching, beer-swilling patrons filled the inside bars and outdoor patio.
    — Samantha Mendiguren, Fox News, 8 June 2017
  • There’s even a full-page drawing of a cherubic Bacchus swilling wine from a bottle while peeing.
    — Dave McIntyre, Washington Post, 21 Feb. 2020
  • These clubs can all afford to indulge such whims, such is the money swilling around the Premier League.
    — Rory Smith, New York Times, 19 Jan. 2018
  • Not enough water, and the guaiacol won't bubble up into the nostrils of your whiskey-swilling patrons.
    — Jenna Gallegos, chicagotribune.com, 17 Aug. 2017
  • My coffee-swilling colleague, Phillip Valys, gave me a terrific tip.
    — Doreen Christensen, Sun-Sentinel.com, 28 Sep. 2017
  • This was two days after the orders were sent, so there was quite a bit of pencil chewing, nail biting, and coffee swilling in the meantime.
    — David Szondy, New Atlas, 18 May 2025
  • Vicky Dawson is loopy and judgmental as Becca’s wine-swilling mom Nat.
    — Pam Kragen, San Diego Union-Tribune, 15 Feb. 2026
  • Do your wedding dress daydreams include a champagne-swilling afternoon trying on the finest in bridal couture?
    — Melissa Colgan, Harper's BAZAAR, 11 Dec. 2018
  • And what of the bankers who swilled Petrus from the bottle and lit Cuban cigars with hundred-dollar bills burned down to the Benjamins?
    — Jay Cheshes, Town & Country, 6 Feb. 2013
  • Will the little god-king son of Odin learn to be anything more than a mead-swilling hot head running from adventure to adventure?
    — Jason Johnson, The Root, 3 Nov. 2017
  • Dale Soules gives a hilarious, scene-stealing performance as the beer-swilling mom.
    — Pam Kragen, San Diego Union-Tribune, 22 Sep. 2025
  • There’s the youngest, most freewheeling son’s habit of swilling cold coffee while watching The Gong Show.
    — Literary Hub, 20 May 2026
  • And as always, players swilled beer out of it in front of cheering crowds at the Elbo Room in Fort Lauderdale.
    — Miami Herald, 6 Sep. 2025
  • Rod Crawford has heard plenty of firsthand accounts of spider-swilling slumberers.
    — Annie Sneed, Scientific American, 15 Apr. 2014
  • The days of Rebel Blue Volvo wagons swilling gasoline and squirting oil into spinning turbos may be about to end.
    — Clifford Atiyeh, Car and Driver, 22 June 2017
  • Charlotte’s sipping Champagne, while Carrie’s swilling double vodkas on the rocks.
    — refinery29.com, 6 June 2018
  • Predictably, they were not eaten, but the bubbly was swilled enthusiastically.
    — Booth Moore, The Hollywood Reporter, 10 Sep. 2017
  • Consumption of their brews has surged by two-thirds over the past five years, figures from GlobalData show, even as overall beer-swilling declines.
    — The Economist, 7 Sep. 2017
  • The new Soviet elite continued to wolf haute cuisine with the same élan as their vodka-swilling Czarist predecessors.
    — Jim Kempton, Orange County Register, 2 Aug. 2019
  • Tessa Thompson is a great addition as the booze-swilling Valkyrie, and Cate Blanchett has fun slumming as the goddess of death.
    — Bill Goodykoontz, azcentral, 6 July 2018
  • Fighting off hordes of alien monstrosities AND digging for rare minerals in outer space as a crew of beer-swilling, ass kicking space dwarves?
    — Fran Ruiz, Space.com, 6 Oct. 2025
  • Spirit swilling was down 5% in California, compared with a 4% drop nationwide.
    — Teri Sforza, Oc Register, 15 May 2026
  • To Western brewers who've tied their ambitious growth strategies to the beer-swilling habits of the Chinese, the costs are beginning to come into focus.
    — Adrian Croft, Fortune, 5 Feb. 2020
  • He's also known for having epic fashion shows, complete with beer-swilling models and rappers like Cam'ron Giles and Pusha T on the runway.
    — Andrew D. Luecke, Esquire, 16 Feb. 2015
  • Your standard maternal protagonist is not dropping a trail of pacifiers behind her, swilling goblets of red wine the minute her rug rats are in bed, and secretly vaping in the linen closet?
    — Chloe Schama, Vogue, 14 May 2018

swill

2 of 2 noun
  • I don't know what's in this swill, but I know that I'm not eating it.
  • The post-race electrolyte swill tastes like champagne.
    — Frederick Dreier, Outside, 11 Feb. 2026
  • Much has been written about the fabled three-martini swill fests of yore, but too little has been made of the eating.
    — Dan Piepenbring, Harpers Magazine, 24 Mar. 2026
  • Lots of mud, mixed with blood and guts, because what’s Westeros if not a queasy swill of muck and bodily fluids?
    — Lorraine Ali, Los Angeles Times, 16 Jan. 2026
  • Still, the format hasn’t fully shaken its association with cheap swill like Franzia.
    — Esther Mobley, San Francisco Chronicle, 27 Mar. 2024
  • Despite the gaps in the Peaky Blinders lineup, the show’s iconic universe of tan-colored leather, suave tailoring, hard liquor, swill, and grime has been carefully restored.
    — Miriam Balanescu, IndieWire, 5 Mar. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'swill.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: