hitch a ride
idiom
informal
: to get a ride in a passing vehicle
Her car broke down, so she had to hitch a ride with a passing truck.
Examples of hitch a ride in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
Coastal fog — which forms when moist air condenses over the cool, ocean water and drifts toward shore — then picks up water evaporating from the ocean surface, allowing methyl mercury to hitch a ride onto land.
—
Daniella Garcia Almeida, Mercury News, 13 Jan. 2026
Contacts can cause those corneal abrasions that provide the pathogen with a point of entry; acanthamoeba can also hitch a ride on the surface of a lens or become trapped between a contact and the eye, making burrowing deeper possible.
—Kristen Rogers, CNN Money, 10 Jan. 2026
Only the first season is available to stream on Netflix, but with 13 episodes ready to go, there are plenty of reasons to hitch a ride on the Magic School Bus.
—Will Harris, Entertainment Weekly, 4 Jan. 2026
In a medical robotics breakthrough, scientists at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) have built a new kind of microcatheter that can hitch a ride on the bloodstream to navigate the body’s narrowest arteries, even thinner than a human hair.
—Neetika Walter, Interesting Engineering, 27 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for hitch a ride
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to
show current usage.
Read More
Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.
Send us feedback.
Daniella Garcia Almeida, Mercury News, 13 Jan. 2026
Contacts can cause those corneal abrasions that provide the pathogen with a point of entry; acanthamoeba can also hitch a ride on the surface of a lens or become trapped between a contact and the eye, making burrowing deeper possible.
—Kristen Rogers, CNN Money, 10 Jan. 2026
Only the first season is available to stream on Netflix, but with 13 episodes ready to go, there are plenty of reasons to hitch a ride on the Magic School Bus.
—Will Harris, Entertainment Weekly, 4 Jan. 2026
In a medical robotics breakthrough, scientists at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) have built a new kind of microcatheter that can hitch a ride on the bloodstream to navigate the body’s narrowest arteries, even thinner than a human hair.
—Neetika Walter, Interesting Engineering, 27 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for hitch a ride
Cite this Entry
“Hitch a ride.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hitch%20a%20ride. Accessed 31 Jan. 2026.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
