How to Use thwart in a Sentence

thwart

1 of 2 verb
  • The army thwarted the attempt at a coup.
  • She did all she could to thwart his plans.
  • But what if your smart home isn't smart enough to thwart thieves?
    — Sara Rodrigues, House Beautiful, 19 Dec. 2018
  • Some of those threats have been thwarted.
    — Boston Herald Editorial Staff, Boston Herald, 10 June 2026
  • But those plans have been thwarted by one of their own.
    — Phillip M. Bailey, USA Today, 3 Nov. 2025
  • The data is out there, and thieves may use it in ways that freezes cannot thwart.
    — Ron Lieber, The Seattle Times, 8 Sep. 2017
  • Why would phages acquire a system that evolved to thwart them?
    — Bymitch Leslie, science.org, 23 Nov. 2022
  • Tabarez was full of praise for the way in which his side thwarted the hosts' game plan.
    — SI.com, 26 June 2018
  • But, for now, that effort, too, has been thwarted.
    — Beth Mole, ArsTechnica, 19 May 2026
  • Few things thwart your efforts for a lush, healthy landscape quite like onion grass.
    — Madeline Buiano, Martha Stewart, 26 Apr. 2026
  • But the bill was quickly thwarted by the House.
    — Kaia Hubbard, CBS News, 2 Apr. 2026
  • But a growing call to thwart these efforts has been taking hold.
    — Char Adams, NBC News, 17 Oct. 2023
  • The problem is not that her campaign was thwarted by dirty tricks.
    — Monitor Editors, The Christian Science Monitor, 28 Oct. 2017
  • To thwart them, make small cages around the bulbs from chicken wire, then bury the bulb inside them.
    — Arricca Elin Sansone, Country Living, 24 Aug. 2022
  • The dam had been thwarted by persistent drought, then sprung leaks.
    — Julie Bourdin, NPR, 11 Apr. 2026
  • But the coup that ousted the president may thwart both those aims in the short term.
    — Washington Post, 20 Aug. 2020
  • Schools should build on those propensities, not ignore or thwart them.
    — Susan Engel, Time, 23 Feb. 2021
  • This clever ruse thwarted the late-summer naval attack.
    — Kaitlyn Yarborough, Southern Living, 15 May 2026
  • That helped thwart the efforts by guards to get the inmates off the roof, the reports show.
    — Jason Stein, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 27 Oct. 2017
  • Others fear that a desire by many to simply move on will thwart a review.
    — Elinor Aspegren, USA TODAY, 18 June 2021
  • In all, 250 civilians died that night, but the coup was thwarted.
    — Umar Farooq, latimes.com, 13 July 2019
  • The Royals had a chance in the eighth inning but were thwarted by a close play.
    — Maria Torres, kansascity, 10 June 2018
  • Both were thwarted by Nolan and Bailey.
    — Nellie Andreeva, Deadline, 6 Jan. 2026
  • Banks sometimes hide the devices in stacks of bills in an effort to thwart robberies.
    — David Hernandez, San Diego Union-Tribune, 1 Nov. 2021
  • Blaine sees it as a thief, hence all his efforts to thwart the natural passing of it.
    — Nick Romano, Entertainment Weekly, 23 May 2026
  • An airline that might react quickly to thwart a new start-up may have their eye off the ball for a while.
    — Ben Baldanza, Forbes, 15 Aug. 2022
  • The heroic attempt to thwart such a heist ends in catastrophe.
    — Nick Romano, EW.com, 11 June 2019
  • Making these small shifts can help stave off the stress and guilt that can thwart your self-improvement goals.
    — Michele Patterson Ford, The Conversation, 15 Jan. 2026
  • The set, the props, the lighting and the sound thwart the performers at every turn.
    — Charles McNulty, latimes.com, 12 July 2019
  • But this process can be thwarted for all kinds of reasons, not all of them well understood.
    — Julia Belluz, Vox, 9 Nov. 2018

thwart

2 of 2 noun
  • The center yoke thwart is perfectly balanced for one-person portages.
    — The Editors, Outside Online, 18 May 2018
  • Israel says the raids are meant to crack down on Palestinians militants and thwart attacks.
    — Majdi Mohammed, BostonGlobe.com, 4 July 2023
  • The bench units, led by the immovable Jamal Shead, thwart first, second and third tries to fight to the basket.
    — Fred Katz, New York Times, 9 Jan. 2026
  • Since 1736, the noun thwart has referred to the pieces of wood or metal that reinforce the hulls of canoes and boats.
    — Melissa Mohr, The Christian Science Monitor, 13 Dec. 2021
  • The canoe’s triple-layer polyethylene hull shows no wear but a few scratches after a decade of use, and the wood thwarts and nylon web seats seem like new.
    — The Editors, Outside Online, 31 July 2024
  • How much does the government's role thwart innovation to address actual on the ground issues?
    — Roger Valdez, Forbes, 1 Sep. 2021
  • Although the video does include a rig that involves drilling a mast beam (or thwart) into the canoe’s upper hull edge ( or gunwales), there is also a route that instead uses clamps.
    — Andrew Paul, Popular Science, 2 July 2026
  • An outfitter named Craig had rented me the 15-foot canoe with a broken thwart, splintering gunwales, and the tanker toilet.
    — Florence Williams, Outside Online, 1 Feb. 2022
  • Luckily, this episode ends up being just as positive as the party was, after Justin and Griffin thwart Travis’s doldrums and move on to doling out free and funny advice.
    — Pablo Goldstein, Vulture, 1 July 2021
  • Further, without good data, all sides are prone to suspicion, frustration, and -- quite often -- disputes that eventually kill investments and thwart development.
    — Matt Mossman, Foreign Affairs, 29 Jan. 2014
  • Experts such as Byres say that what’s needed are active security measures that detect and thwart attacks, as opposed to what the utilities have been doing—simply trying to wall off their control systems.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 20 Apr. 2016
  • This can enable organizations to deliver a coordinated response and thwart cyberattacks.
    — Etay Maor, Forbes, 18 Oct. 2024
  • Be cautious of herbicides The most common mistakes that thwart fall lawn reseeding efforts are insufficient site preparation, inconsistent watering, and overfertilization.
    — Paul Cappiello, Louisville Courier Journal, 24 Sep. 2025
  • The Justice Department argues in a federal antitrust suit that Google is a dominant tech company that has abused its market power to bully industry partners, protect its monopoly and thwart competition.
    — Steve Lohr, New York Times, 11 Sep. 2023
  • But when that other person tries to impede the investigation, obstruct the investigation, thwart investigators by counseling attorneys to lie, by trying to destroy security camera footage, that helps illuminate that person's intent.
    — Nbc Universal, NBC News, 30 July 2023
  • In a surprise move, Florida officials are proposing drastically reducing eligibility for the state AIDS drug assistance program, which critics say will force thousands of people to seek help to obtain HIV medicines and thwart efforts to combat the infectious disease.
    — Ed Silverman, STAT, 20 Jan. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'thwart.' 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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