toy with

phrasal verb

toyed with; toying with; toys with

1

: to think about (something) briefly and not very seriously

I toyed with the idea of moving to France but ended up staying here.

2

: to move or touch (something) with one's fingers often without thinking

She toyed with her hair while she talked on the phone.

3

: to deal with or control (someone or something) in a clever and usually unfair or selfish way

Do you really love me, or are you just toying with me?

Don't toy with my emotions.

Examples of toy with in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The climactic scenes toy with the blurred lines between hallucination and reality, but the logic falls apart; threads like Hana’s rash decision to undertake a dangerous surgical fix virtually evaporate without much payoff. —David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 3 Feb. 2026

The Astros have toyed with trying him in center field, and that might be his best path to greater value. —Keith Law, New York Times, 3 Feb. 2026

Many of those states are toying with doing so. —Lance Eliot, Forbes.com, 30 Jan. 2026

But Tomon, who was visiting his home city of Budapest, found time to toy with the Cayley graph. —Leila Sloman, Quanta Magazine, 28 Jan. 2026