ostensible

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

That Belmondo morphs from appealing photojournalist to unlikable sexual cad while the picture’s ostensible star—Claude Brasseur as an inadvertent cop killer—disappears for long stretches does the picture no favors.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 21, 2026

All of the growth coming, as Russell notes, detention and deportation being shown to be ineffective at the administration’s ostensible goal of reducing crime.

From Salon • Jul. 26, 2025

But the movie is more effective as a grim, involving cop thriller than it is as an ostensible statement on the Order’s reverberations in the present.

From New York Times • Dec. 6, 2024

The resulting document, released late last year, is something of a paradox—a list of ostensible directives that are couched in voluntary language, with nobody empowered to enforce them.

From Slate • Dec. 5, 2024

In the following chapters we will see time and again how a dramatic increase in the collective power and ostensible success of our species went hand in hand with much individual suffering.

From "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari