underplaying

present participle of underplay

Example Sentences

Recent Examples of Synonyms for underplaying
Verb
  • To call Molly and Frankie aimless would be, somehow, both understating the case and missing it completely.
    Angie Han, HollywoodReporter, 12 Aug. 2026
  • Investor Michael Burry went further in November 2025, estimating that big cloud firms were understating AI depreciation by about $176 billion from 2026 through 2028.
    Robert J. Szczerba, Forbes.com, 11 Aug. 2026
Verb
  • Tomlin, Fonda and Parton played a trio of secretaries who took revenge on their sexist boss by kidnapping him and enacting changes in the workplace in his name.
    Lori A Bashian, FOXNews.com, 29 Aug. 2026
  • The appeal came less than 24 hours after Talwani issued a 14-day temporary restraining order blocking parts of USPS’s new rule enacting new guardrails on mail-in voting in the name of election security.
    Molly Parks, The Washington Examiner, 28 Aug. 2026
Verb
  • Much like Big Tobacco was forced to admit that cigarettes can cause cancer or Purdue Pharma was forced to stop downplaying the risks of OxyContin, this agreement now puts Meta’s core products in a negative light.
    Diane Brady, Fortune, 27 Aug. 2026
  • One of Gates’ most striking claims, though, is that tech leaders are knowingly downplaying AI’s risks because of the money involved.
    Frank Landymore, Futurism, 26 Aug. 2026
Verb
  • At the University of Mississippi, a video went viral of a Black woman surrounded by white students and the white students mimicking ape-like motions toward the woman and making monkey-like calls.
    Irene Wright, USA Today, 28 Aug. 2026
  • Researchers have developed a six-legged robot that can learn to walk by mimicking a stick insect’s movement patterns.
    Jijo Malayil, Interesting Engineering, 28 Aug. 2026
Verb
  • Garcia lends the whole song theater-kid interpretation, essentially acting out the lyrics in pantomime, grasping out in front of her, clutching her face.
    Rebecca Alter, Vulture, 25 Aug. 2026
  • When the child started acting out at home, his family reportedly started asking questions of the boy and made a report to law enforcement.
    Mary Whitfill Roeloffs, Forbes.com, 18 Aug. 2026
Verb
  • Slop is formulaic and impersonal, the aggregate of everything that is already imitating everything else.
    Becca Rothfeld, New Yorker, 29 Aug. 2026
  • Even white people imitating Black people don’t talk like that anymore.
    Alex Ritman, Variety, 28 Aug. 2026
Verb
  • Before taking on her first solo anchoring role, Hylton frequently served as a fill-in anchor across the network’s morning, dayside and primetime programming.
    Jill Goldsmith, Deadline, 31 Aug. 2026
  • As the world expands, Musashi can go around taking on requests from the townfolk for resources to upgrade his sword, armor, and gauntlet.
    Zackery Cuevas, PC Magazine, 31 Aug. 2026
Verb
  • Critics and fanboy media thrashed Supergirl not just for its Guardians of the Galaxy touchstones, but also for aping Mad Max.
    Anthony D'Alessandro, Deadline, 29 June 2026
  • For Shorts, the label will appear as a small overlay at the bottom of the video itself, although that will add to the already cluttered look of the TikTok-aping Shorts.
    ArsTechnica, ArsTechnica, 27 May 2026
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.

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Cite this Entry

“Underplaying.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/underplaying. Accessed 1 Sep. 2026.

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