Thesaurus.com
Dictionary.com
Showing results for instrument. Search instead for suchinstrument.
Definitions

instrument

[in-struh-muhnt] / ˈɪn strə mənt /




Usage

What are other ways to say instrument? An instrument is anything used in doing a certain type of work or producing a certain result, especially such as requires delicacy, accuracy, or precision: surgical or musical instruments. A tool is a contrivance held in and worked by the hand, for assisting the work of (especially) mechanics or skilled laborers: a carpenter's tools. An implement is any tool or contrivance designed or used for a particular purpose: agricultural implements. A utensil is especially an article for domestic use: kitchen utensils. 

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.

See Examples For:

The instrument is expected to detect planets that are 100 million times fainter than their host stars, a performance 100 to 1,000 times better than existing space-based coronagraphs.

From Science Daily Aug. 28, 2026

On “American Dream,” Mr. Cockrell’s instrument has a slapback effect, as if he’s playing underwater, echoing the lyric’s description of feeling overwhelmed and weighted down by the state of the world.

From The Wall Street Journal Aug. 25, 2026

The sound stage felt bludgeoned into submission throughout, as the intense distortion of bass, percussion and guitars made the instrument separation within the mix almost inaudible.

From Los Angeles Times Aug. 16, 2026

A melodica is a handheld instrument played by blowing air into a reed, which is attached to a keyboard.

From BBC Aug. 13, 2026

Paul Jennings grabbed an instrument and added to the celebration.

From "In the Shadow of Liberty" by Kenneth C. Davis

In addition to the variety of instruments evoking the sounds of nature, it incorporated breathwork, vocal exercises and a small amount of physical sensation: a refreshing spritz of rose water.

From Los Angeles Times Aug. 28, 2026

These cameras are standard spacecraft instruments that detect bright objects in space and help determine a spacecraft's orientation and position.

From Science Daily Aug. 26, 2026

Catching them in nets and fitting the instruments takes about 20 minutes: a brief stressful episode after which the animals return to normal behavior.

From Barron's Aug. 26, 2026

The chairman has a few instruments for holding a committee together.

From The Wall Street Journal Aug. 26, 2026

Seismometers could detect movement of the earth’s crust far from where the instruments were actually located.

From "Mountain of Fire" by Rebecca E. F. Barone

Because of these risks, the landslide area has been extensively instrumented since 2020.

From Science Daily Dec. 21, 2025

Then we browsed the For You page feed for each sockpuppet, recording what we saw via WebArchive.page, a specially instrumented web browser that archives all the data involved in a browsing session locally.

From Washington Post Mar. 30, 2023

Pacific Missile Range Facility Barking Sands, a U.S. naval facility, is the world's largest instrumented, "multi-dimensional" testing and training missile range, according to the U.S.

From Fox News Feb. 22, 2022

"This is the most heavily instrumented vehicle we will ever fly so we will get a tremendous amount of engineering data on vibration and temperature and stress, acoustics," said Mr Shannon.

From BBC Mar. 18, 2021

We are unlikely to determine the answer to this question without landing instrumented space vehicles on the Titanian surface.

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan

“We are instrumenting the car in a way that is overloading the driver just like we were overloading the helicopter pilots,” said Strayer, director of the university’s Center for the Prevention of Distracted Driving.

From Los Angeles Times Jul. 6, 2022

This can be a result of budgetary constraints, the difficulty of instrumenting treacherous volcanoes and, in some cases, red tape preventing the placement of sensors in wilderness areas.

From New York Times Nov. 9, 2021

“And we need to rethink what this instrumenting of the world — all that data being generated and collected — means for privacy and how all this data is used.”

From New York Times Aug. 4, 2015

Yet little has been done to probe the underlying crust and mantle, mainly because instrumenting the entire state is so expensive.

From Scientific American Nov. 5, 2013

Niels and I get to work carefully instrumenting the sleep logger and attaching it to the bird.

From New York Times Apr. 15, 2011




Vocabulary lists containing instrument


Vocabulary.com logo
by dictionary.com

Dictionary.com's Learning Companion

Go beyond just looking up words.
Remember them forever with VocabTrainer.

Start training