pin down

verb

pinned down; pinning down; pins down

transitive verb

1

: to cause or force (someone) to make a definite statement or decision about something

Reporters tried to pin him down on the specific changes he wants to make to the tax laws.

2

: to find out (something) with certainty

Can you pin down when the change occurred?

I'm trying to pin the source of the problem down.

Examples of pin down in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

This summer has seen a confluence of challenges, including excessive heat that allows food contamination to grow and a pathogen that’s particularly tough to pin down. — Deidre McPhillips, CNN Money, 13 Aug. 2026

Doing In-Person Media Tours Traditional in-person media tours have lost impact as hybrid work emptied many newsrooms and made reporters harder to pin down in person. — Expert Panel®, Forbes.com, 10 Aug. 2026

Look for cash The super-rich are calling lawyers to figure out the scope of their exposure and pin down a tax bill. — Anniek Bao,lee Ying Shan, CNBC, 5 Aug. 2026

The degree to which this is true is both of crucial importance and hard to pin down. — Jon Allsop, New Yorker, 3 Aug. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1765, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for pin down

• adown
• blowdown
• breakdown
• countdown
• crackdown
• crosstown
• downtown
• drawdown
• dropdown
• facedown
• godown
• hometown