string along

verb

strung along; stringing along; strings along

transitive verb

1

: to keep waiting

strung him along until the boss was back from lunch

2

: deceive, fool

stringing us along with ruses and red herrings

—John Powers

intransitive verb

: go along, agree

held her tongue and strung along with the rest of them

Synonyms

• bamboozle
• beguile
• bluff
• buffalo
• burn
• catch
• con
• cozen
• deceive
• delude
• dupe
• fake out
• fool
• gaff
• gammon
• gull
• have
• have on [chiefly British]
• hoax
• hoodwink
• hornswoggle
• humbug
• juggle
• misguide
• misinform
• mislead
• snooker
• snow
• spoof
• suck in
• sucker
• take in
• trick

Examples of string along in a Sentence

the student succeeded in stringing even his teachers along with his tales of family hardships

Recent Examples on the Web

And in the weeks since, events across the U.S and even in Europe have popped up and had at least one interesting tidbit to keep people strung along. —Ct Jones, Rolling Stone, 21 Nov. 2024

Other times, a team might be strung along by a player with little interest, but who needs a plausible threat to spark a bidding war for their preferred destination. —Sean McIndoe, The Athletic, 5 July 2024

Spooled up inside our devices, wrapped around our walls, strung along our streets, millions of tons of thin metallic threads do the job of electrifying the world. —Gregory Barber, WIRED, 14 July 2022

Not asking me out, of course, just stringing along a purposeless conversation. —R29 Team, refinery29.com, 2 Sep. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1914, in the meaning defined at transitive sense 1

Kids Definition

string along

verb

1

: to go along : agree

string along with the majority

2

: deceive sense 1, fool

would string us along with false promises