as in dead metaphor
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Recent Examples of code word
Though Roblox has built-in features that ban words like 'Snapchat' in an effort to prevent off-app conversations, users work around it by substituting certain emojis or code words.
—
Ryan Murphy, IndyStar, 20 Nov. 2025
Was there literally a code word?
—Benjamin Siegel, ABC News, 21 Oct. 2025
Greater Manchester Police had declared PLATO – a national code word used when police deploy armed officers across the force to the scene of an attack, CNN understands.
—Peter Wilkinson, CNN Money, 2 Oct. 2025
So, the vertices that are indexing positions of my code word.
—Quanta Magazine, 7 Aug. 2025
See All Example Sentences for code word
Ryan Murphy, IndyStar, 20 Nov. 2025
Was there literally a code word?
—Benjamin Siegel, ABC News, 21 Oct. 2025
Greater Manchester Police had declared PLATO – a national code word used when police deploy armed officers across the force to the scene of an attack, CNN understands.
—Peter Wilkinson, CNN Money, 2 Oct. 2025
So, the vertices that are indexing positions of my code word.
—Quanta Magazine, 7 Aug. 2025
See All Example Sentences for code word
Recent Examples of Synonyms for code word
Noun
-
Many of our emotion terms are references to states of the body—we’re downcast, bent out of shape, head over heels, shaken up, down in the mouth—which have slowly rigidified into dead metaphor.—
Nikhil Krishnan,
The New Yorker,
1 Aug. 2022
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This shift reminds us that dead metaphors aren’t always terminally dead.—
Rob Nixon,
Smithsonian,
23 Mar. 2018
Noun
-
Baseball has a lot of good analogies for fatherhood, even if most of them break down rather quickly.—
Caleb Harris,
Austin American Statesman,
4 Feb. 2026
-
That’s the American analogy, where the traditional governing elite of one of the great parties of much of the country committed itself to something not just in the defense of slavery, but to slavery-plus, fortified and amplified by treason.—
David Frum,
The Atlantic,
28 Jan. 2026
Noun
-
Along with another allusion to his quip about Lucien’s death, that simile establishes the Anglo-Irish author as a terrifying counter-example of homosexual exposure.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
2 Feb. 2026
-
Consider, for instance, the use of rhetorical figures such as metaphor or simile.—
Nino Letteriello,
Forbes.com,
22 Aug. 2025
Noun
-
The gloves are off, the language is blunter, and the patience for euphemism is gone.—
Seth Abramovitch,
HollywoodReporter,
6 Feb. 2026
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Everything else is a euphemism for old fashioned domination that the region has spent generations trying to escape.—
Boris Muñoz,
Time,
12 Jan. 2026
Noun
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Yet the American Dream is a powerful metaphor and aspiration that continues to inspire many in this country.—
Mark Robert Rank,
Fortune,
8 Feb. 2026
-
Swift has long been drawn to the beauty and metaphor of its namesake stone.—
Bryan West,
USA Today,
6 Feb. 2026
Noun
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But in terms of its actual content, the statement was pretty thin gruel, bristling with public relations-style circumlocution and vagueness.—
Business Columnist,
Los Angeles Times,
27 Jan. 2026
-
Here, instead, she’s swayed by a dead Diana softly squeezing her hand and kindly hinting — the dead Diana is an ace at tactful circumlocution — that now is the time to show a mourning nation some emotion.—
Tom Gliatto,
Peoplemag,
16 Nov. 2023
Cite this Entry
“Code word.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/code%20word. Accessed 14 Feb. 2026.
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