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sieve

verb

Definition of sievenext
as in to filter

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Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of sieve After sufficient brewing time, pour the tea into the pitcher through a fine mesh filter or sieve to remove the loose leaves or take out and throw out the whole tea bags. — Bestreviews, Mercury News, 19 June 2026 Creativity is not just some commodity, trapped in the imagination, that can be tapped and sieved by technology. — John Semley, Wired News, 1 Apr. 2026 The mixture is then sieved to produce a smooth, drinkable liquid. — Sarah Bence, Verywell Health, 29 Jan. 2026 The combine then automatically calibrates variables like rotor speed, fan speed and sieve clearances to produce those outcomes. — Michael L. Millenson, Forbes.com, 13 Jan. 2026 The light here is dazzling, even more so when sieved through lime and olive leaves and wooden canopies to dance on walls, terracotta tables, and guests’ faces. — Rosalyn Wikeley, Condé Nast Traveler, 10 Jan. 2026 Traitors is about the gullible and the skeptical working together to sieve the fraudulent from the truthful, an amalgamated nightmare of village idiots locking themselves in the stocks and pelting each other with rotten fruit. — Raven Smith, Vogue, 9 Jan. 2026 These recordings function like a kind of filter or sieve, retaining one part of us while the rest is allowed to drain away. — Rachel Cusk, New Yorker, 24 Aug. 2025 Our students have spent hundreds of hours focusing on the fossils retrieved after sieving. — Kristi Curry Rogers, Scientific American, 1 Feb. 2024
Recent Examples of Synonyms for sieve
  1. filter
  2. sift
  3. screen
  4. strain
Verb
  • About 50 people filtered into the Perez Architecture Center for the event, many holding plates of danishes and boxes of Royal Dansk Danish butter cookies laid on tables by the entrance.
    — Zoey Thomas, Miami Herald, 5 Sep. 2026
  • The book is largely plotless with little characterization beyond what the speakers reveal in their monologues, which are mostly filtered through Faye’s narrative rather than presented as dialogue.
    — René Ostberg, Encyclopedia Britannica, 2 Sep. 2026
Definition of filter
Verb
  • This might be fine for a night or two to diagnose a sleep disorder, but gathering enough data on enough people to sift out long-term statistical correlations just isn’t feasible.
    — Mike McRae September 17, New Atlas, 17 Sep. 2026
  • There’s a lot to sift through, and knowing which pieces are actually worth your cart takes some finesse.
    — Annie Blackman, InStyle, 3 Sep. 2026
Definition of sift
Verb
  • But immigrants in Miami are forced to wait hours before guards let them get screened, letting people into the lobby to scan their items through the X-ray machines in groups around the time of their hearings.
    — Syra Ortiz Blanes, Miami Herald, 17 Sep. 2026
  • Rather than prohibit every version of the display, the board expressly invited the Heuers to propose dimming, shielding or screening the lights, reducing their number or directing them downward.
    — Théoden Janes, Charlotte Observer, 17 Sep. 2026
Definition of screen
Verb
  • China’s growth target is already its lowest since 1991, and the economic picture is darkened further by a real estate downturn that is straining local government finances and undercutting spending capacity, Goldman Sachs said in a note to clients.
    — Jeronimo Gonzalez, semafor.com, 7 Sep. 2026
  • In the years that followed, the family relationships viewers once watched on television became increasingly strained, with some of those disputes eventually playing out in public.
    — Danielle Minnetian, FOXNews.com, 5 Sep. 2026
Definition of strain

Browse Nearby Words

siestas
sieve
sieved
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Cite this Entry

“Sieve.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/sieve. Accessed 19 Sep. 2026.

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