whittle down
phrasal verb
whittled down; whittling down; whittles down
: to gradually make (something) smaller by removing parts
We whittled the list down to four people.
Examples of whittle down in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
That’s enabled by some spectacular mathematics around gear-wheel geometries: For the wheels involved, the team whittled down 22 trillion combinations for the proportions, number, and shape of the teeth to find a solution (using a dedicated computer simulation).
—
Jeremy White, WIRED, 11 Apr. 2024
State departments could lose some funding for personnel and operations this fiscal year as California leaders try to whittle down spending and deliver a balanced state budget.
—Maya Miller, Sacramento Bee, 26 Mar. 2024
This is always the cruelest category, in which all of international cinema is whittled down to five nominees.
—Jake Coyle and Lindsey Bahr, San Diego Union-Tribune, 8 Mar. 2024
OpenAI’s six-person board was whittled down to an interim board of three: Bret Taylor, a former Salesforce and Facebook executive, joined as a board chairman helping to appoint a new set of directors.
—Cade Metz, New York Times, 7 Mar. 2024
Producers whittled down hundreds of applicants to 40 and flew everyone to Los Angeles for final rounds.
—Cheyenne Roundtree, Rolling Stone, 5 Mar. 2024
Then, Journal Sentinel staff whittle down the pool of candidates to a shortlist of finalists and turn to the public for help choosing that week's winner.
—Journal Sentinel, 19 Feb. 2024
Instead, Moreno struggled to break away from the pack and whittle down a plurality of undecided voters that dominated recent polls.
—USA TODAY, 18 Mar. 2024
The effort helped the industry whittle down Democrats’ original plans in 2022 to negotiate a wider range of drugs on a more aggressive timeline.
—Tony Romm, Washington Post, 11 Mar. 2024
Jeremy White, WIRED, 11 Apr. 2024
State departments could lose some funding for personnel and operations this fiscal year as California leaders try to whittle down spending and deliver a balanced state budget.
—Maya Miller, Sacramento Bee, 26 Mar. 2024
This is always the cruelest category, in which all of international cinema is whittled down to five nominees.
—Jake Coyle and Lindsey Bahr, San Diego Union-Tribune, 8 Mar. 2024
OpenAI’s six-person board was whittled down to an interim board of three: Bret Taylor, a former Salesforce and Facebook executive, joined as a board chairman helping to appoint a new set of directors.
—Cade Metz, New York Times, 7 Mar. 2024
Producers whittled down hundreds of applicants to 40 and flew everyone to Los Angeles for final rounds.
—Cheyenne Roundtree, Rolling Stone, 5 Mar. 2024
Then, Journal Sentinel staff whittle down the pool of candidates to a shortlist of finalists and turn to the public for help choosing that week's winner.
—Journal Sentinel, 19 Feb. 2024
Instead, Moreno struggled to break away from the pack and whittle down a plurality of undecided voters that dominated recent polls.
—USA TODAY, 18 Mar. 2024
The effort helped the industry whittle down Democrats’ original plans in 2022 to negotiate a wider range of drugs on a more aggressive timeline.
—Tony Romm, Washington Post, 11 Mar. 2024
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'whittle down.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Dictionary Entries Near whittle down
Cite this Entry
“Whittle down.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/whittle%20down. Accessed 19 Apr. 2024.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
Share