How to Use starve in a Sentence

starve

verb
  • They left him to starve out in the desert.
  • It was clear that the dog had been starved.
  • You don't have to starve yourself to lose weight.
  • Without food they would starve.
  • They tried to starve their enemies into submission.
  • The virus may invade the brain, or starve it of oxygen.
    Eliza MacKintosh, CNN, 2 June 2020
  • In the Tamil Eelam, no one would starve, steal, or rape.
    Longreads, 22 May 2018
  • At first, the team assumed the wolves would eat the deer and move on—or starve and perish.
    Doug Johnson, Ars Technica, 26 Jan. 2023
  • The actor had six weeks to learn to play Chopin and to starve himself.
    Anne Thompson, IndieWire, 16 Dec. 2024
  • There is this man who’s about to starve himself to death.
    Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 3 Feb. 2021
  • But since 2018, eight of the animals have died — three of whom starved, the group said.
    Brendan Rascius, Miami Herald, 16 May 2024
  • If the layer of thatch is ½ inch thick or thicker, in can starve the lawn.
    Joseph Truini, Popular Mechanics, 8 July 2019
  • For these, men starved themselves to death in hunger strikes.
    Michael Brendan Dougherty, National Review, 10 Feb. 2018
  • He was then left alone in the woods to starve when the devil paid him a visit.
    Samantha Highfill, EW.com, 18 July 2022
  • With the stroke of a pen, Roy Garret could let the whole island city starve.
    Martin Vassolo, Sun-Sentinel.com, 17 Jan. 2018
  • Even then, if all the prairie dogs have died, ferrets will starve.
    Elizabeth Miller/undark, Popular Science, 11 Jan. 2020
  • So the manatees have to make that choice to stay warm or starve to death in that process.
    Amy Green, orlandosentinel.com, 10 Nov. 2021
  • How can anyone turn away from the plight of a starving child?
    Letters To The Editor, The Orlando Sentinel, 29 May 2025
  • When the snows came, the sheep went down to their traditional range and starved.
    Jack O’Connor, Outdoor Life, 4 Sep. 2024
  • The coalition had laid siege, hoping to starve the fighters out.
    New York Times, 13 Nov. 2021
  • Crews stripped or burned brush in areas near homes in an effort to starve the blaze.
    CBS News, 16 Dec. 2017
  • And yet something compelled her to cut, and to starve herself, and to drink.
    Sophie Gilbert, The Atlantic, 6 Apr. 2018
  • Some critics then said the measure would cause people to starve in the streets.
    Arkansas Online, 2 July 2021
  • If the people closest to the top eat most of the food, then the prisoners near the bottom will starve.
    Stacey Grant, Seventeen, 18 Apr. 2023
  • It could be ordered to starve itself healthy and it could be made to wait for help.
    Andrew Stuttaford, National Review, 17 Apr. 2020
  • When the prey in an area has been eaten, predators must move or starve.
    John Schandelmeier, Anchorage Daily News, 20 Dec. 2020
  • The coral, now bleached, is alive, but slowly starving.
    Denise Hruby, Miami Herald, 29 Aug. 2025
  • Longhorns past and present have been championship-starved for a while now.
    Nick Moyle, ExpressNews.com, 16 Sep. 2019
  • In the decade after 1945 millions of them were beaten to death or shot, or left to starve.
    The Economist, 12 Oct. 2017
  • It's been a challenge for him as there are differing views among the groups on conflicts in the Middle East and how to respond to reports of deaths and starving people in Gaza.
    Niraj Warikoo, Freep.com, 21 Aug. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'starve.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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