come by

came by; come by; coming by; comes by

Definition of come by

transitive verb

: to get possession of : acquire a good job is hard to come by

intransitive verb

: to make a visit came by after dinner

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Examples of come by in a Sentence

come by after work and I'll give you some clothes for the rummage sale a literary award like that isn't easy to come by

Recent Examples on the Web That strategy made establishing a balanced offense hard to come by for Notre Dame’s opposition. — Carter Kartels, Indianapolis Star, "Camping World Bowl: 5 keys for Notre Dame vs. Iowa State," 27 Dec. 2019 Although Macau is much smaller — roughly half the size of Manhattan — its residents have been largely insulated from such pressures by policies that make jobs and passports harder to come by for mainlanders or foreigners. — Jinshan Hong And Iain Marlow / Bloomberg, Time, "Macau Choosing China's Riches Over Democracy Efforts, Unlike Hong Kong," 18 Dec. 2019 As a result, money has become harder or more expensive to come by for many companies. — Alexandra Stevenson, New York Times, "China’s Companies Binged on Debt. Now They Can’t Pay the Bill.," 12 Dec. 2019 Goals have been hard to come by for Pogba's teammates of late, who have managed only 13 goals this season, one of the lowest returns in the top flight. — SI.com, "Ole Gunnar Solskjaer Confirms Paul Pogba's Expected Return Date," 6 Nov. 2019 Definitive numbers are harder to come by for other countries. — Robert F. Service, Science | AAAS, "Department of Energy plans major AI push to speed scientific discoveries," 30 Oct. 2019 That’s often been tricky to come by for text documents. — Wired, "Google Search Now Reads at a Higher Level," 25 Oct. 2019 Money isn't easy to come by for most college students. — Susan Tompor, Detroit Free Press, "Givling app helps trivia players pay student loans, mortgage debt — but it could cost you," 19 Oct. 2019 While numbers are difficult to come by for China, analysts expect there to be around as many as Amazon’s single order today. — Michael J. Coren, Quartz, "Amazon orders 100,000 electric delivery trucks, doubling the fleet in Europe and North America," 19 Sep. 2019

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'come by.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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Last Updated

18 Jan 2020

Cite this Entry

“Come by.” The Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster Inc., https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/come%20by. Accessed 23 January 2020.

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