How to Use but what in a Sentence

but what

phrase

• This used to take at least a week, but what follows will take months.
  — Jonas Barck, Forbes.com, 30 June 2026
• The show will end sooner rather than later, but what a show it’s been.
  — Josh Yohe, New York Times, 31 July 2026
• Horror is red-hot at the box office, but what is up next for the genre?
  — William Earl, Variety, 27 July 2026
• Linen is light and seersucker is a staple, but what about madras?
  — Brett F. Braley-Palko, Forbes.com, 20 July 2026
• Fire may be an insured risk, but what about earthquake damage—or war?
  — Benjamin Maltby, Forbes.com, 10 Aug. 2026
• The games are huge, of course, but what happens on the days between sometimes seems just as big.
  — Dominick Williams, Kansas City Star, 3 July 2026
• Kind of a silly riddle, but what’s life if not a little silly.
  — Erik Kain, Forbes.com, 30 July 2026
• Nobody has a crystal ball, but what are your hopes for the future of Iran?
  — Nick Vivarelli, Variety, 29 June 2026
• Everyone says to keep your electronics with you on a flight, but what about their bulky cords?
  — Hayley Domin, Travel + Leisure, 8 Aug. 2026
• Same meeting, in the same place, but what transpired was quite different.
  — Jason Karlawish, STAT, 28 July 2026
• This is not the stuff of thrilling cliffhangers, but what’s the alternative?
  — Sophie Brookover, Vulture, 10 July 2026
• What stays with me is not just what happened when my father got sick, but what didn’t happen before.
  — Guy Leitersdorf, Forbes.com, 31 July 2026
• The difference is no longer just what can be observed—but what can be verified.
  — Gamuda Contributor, Forbes.com, 4 Aug. 2026
• His body was found days later but what happened to him largely remains a mystery.
  — N'dea Yancey-Bragg, USA Today, 30 July 2026
• What Goldfarb wants seems clear enough, but what does Marc Jacobs want?
  — José Criales-Unzueta, Vanity Fair, 18 Aug. 2026
• Bringing home your very own furbaby is a dream come true, but what might not be included in that dream is the price tag.
  — Maddie Rhodes, USA Today, 19 Aug. 2026
• But what unsettled him was not what was missing from Grokipedia but what was slightly off.
  — Carson Griffith, New Yorker, 30 July 2026
• Walt Weiss will almost certainly break it this year … but what’s the number?
  — Tyler Estep, AJC.com, 14 Aug. 2026
• And then my husband can take our son to the birthday party—but what to do with our preschooler and the baby?
  — Melissa Willets, Parents, 12 July 2026
• It’s been hard to ignore the weakness in chip stocks this week, but what may matter more is how well the stock market holds up.
  — Sarah Min, CNBC, 17 July 2026
• There was some very cool work on display, but what is your broad take about the state of play in animation at the moment?
  — Jesse Whittock, Deadline, 6 July 2026
• Performance rugs might instantly bring patios to mind, but what better place for one than the kitchen?
  — Vy Yang, Architectural Digest, 9 July 2026
• The parks were beautiful, but what stayed with me was the people and their mindset about getting outdoors.
  — Todd Lookingbill, The Conversation, 31 July 2026
• The difference was not simply what the stores carried, but what customers could do inside them.
  — Ayşe Çetinel, Harvard Business Review, 18 Aug. 2026
• Debt doesn't just disappear because the person who owed it has died, but what about the interest charges?
  — Angelica Leicht, CBS News, 1 July 2026
• The deeper question is not how the war will end—but what Russia will look like after the shooting stops.
  — Ariel Cohen, Forbes.com, 21 July 2026
• Not just what happened in the past, but what carried forward, and what is still happening now in different forms.
  — Georg Szalai, HollywoodReporter, 16 Aug. 2026
• The days of teams signing players on the back of a good performance at one World Cup are gone, but what about two?
  — Nick Miller, New York Times, 4 July 2026
• Stressful things are going to happen, but what’s most important is how people respond to that stress.
  — Helen Carefoot, Flow Space, 6 July 2026
• Planning a bike trip can be simple, but what really matters is the experience on the road.
  — Jim Dobson, Forbes.com, 29 June 2026