pick apart

verb

picked apart; picking apart; picks apart

chiefly US

: to say all of the things that are bad or wrong about (someone or something) : to criticize (a person or thing) in a very detailed and usually unkind way

You can expect political analysts to pick apart the governor's speech.

The film's critics picked his performance apart.

Examples of pick apart in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

On social media, speculative analysts pick apart the work that people may have had done. — Jia Tolentino, New Yorker, 11 July 2026

Podcasters have picked apart social media posts for potential Easter eggs. — Jacob Feldman, Sportico.com, 8 July 2026

Focusing on details such as how curators handle Christopher Columbus and undocumented immigrants, the document picks apart the American History Museum’s materials through the lens of right-wing talking points. — Kelsey Ables, The Atlantic, 6 July 2026

Scientists trying to uncover how laughter evolved have picked apart animals’ facial expressions, but less work has been done on how laughs sound. — ABC News, 25 June 2026

Rhymes for pick apart

• counterpart
• art
• cart
• carte
• chart
• dart
• fart
• haart
• mart
• part
• smart
• start