yawning

adjective

yawn·​ing ˈyȯ-niŋ 

1

: wide open : cavernous

a yawning hole

yawning gaps in the plot

2

: showing fatigue or boredom by yawns

a yawning audience

yawningly

ˈyȯ-niŋ-lē 

adverb

Examples of yawning in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Dellandrea still impresses: Stars forward Ty Dellandrea picked up his third assist of the season on Tuesday, working his way to a puck and finding Wyatt Johnston for a yawning cage in the second period. —Dallas News, 25 Oct. 2022

In Palm Beach County, Ian's yawning reach spun up four tornadoes. —Jennifer Borresen, USA Today, 10 Jan. 2023

Wet Leg make fun of something that Harry Styles couldn’t quite capture in his cover of their song on BBC Radio 1: the yawning banality of male attention. —Los Angeles Times, 4 Dec. 2022

But McNamara obtained the transcripts and discovered yawning contradictions. —Globe Staff, BostonGlobe.com, 9 June 2022

Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York may be at opposite ends of the ideological spectrum, but a more yawning gap between figures in the party has existed before. —John Dickerson, The Atlantic, 1 Mar. 2022

The tunnels, some a yawning 33 feet in diameter and running up to 300 feet below city streets, stretch 109 miles and collectively hold 2.3 billion gallons of water. —New York Times, 17 May 2020

In the interim, there was a yawning increase in American’s appetite for streaming entertainment at home. —Chris Wilson, Time, 9 June 2021

There were other Kirby efforts over the years that sold more poorly or were met with more critical derision, but none had such a yawning and humiliating gap between ambition and reality. —Abraham Riesman, Vulture, 18 Mar. 2021

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Word History

First Known Use

before the 12th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1