How to Use huff in a Sentence

huff

1 of 2 verb
  • O'Reilly huffed and puffed and warned of a defamation suit.
    James Warren, The Hive, 7 Dec. 2017
  • Bears tend to huff, paw at the ground or even make small rushes at the person.
    Zaz Hollander, Alaska Dispatch News, 20 June 2017
  • When Leo gets back from his date with a rose in hand, Chris huffs out of the room without saying a word.
    Anna Moeslein, Glamour, 2 July 2018
  • Don’t act out, don’t huff and puff over the indignity of it all — just be busy that day.
    Amy Dickinson, Washington Post, 18 Nov. 2022
  • Don’t act out, don’t huff and puff over the indignity of it all – just, be busy that day.
    Amy Dickinson, oregonlive, 18 Nov. 2022
  • Naomi Watts huffs, puffs, and blows it out of the water in her upcoming thriller The Wolf Hour.
    Joey Nolfi, EW.com, 31 Oct. 2019
  • Two keys to using the mouth call: Don’t simply blow across the reeds, but huff air up from deep in your diaphragm.
    Michael Hanback, Outdoor Life, 20 Apr. 2020
  • Fitness buffs huff and puff up and down the amphitheater aisles all year long, and wise ones keep their eyes open.
    Christopher Reynolds, latimes.com, 12 July 2018
  • There's little to huff and puff about on the mostly level ride with some fun ups and downs and no leg burning climbs.
    Flip Putthoff, Arkansas Online, 21 Dec. 2021
  • Instead of huffing it back up the hill for another run, a tow line pulls riders back up the hill.
    Kellie Hwang, Indianapolis Star, 15 Nov. 2019
  • LeBron James huffed and puffed and took a seat in the second half, the Warriors house still standing strong against his best efforts.
    Bud Shaw, cleveland.com, 5 June 2017
  • Each year, the breadth and reach of this Thanksgiving-adjacent sales event seems to huff and puff and grow ever larger.
    NBC News, 29 Nov. 2019
  • Oldman’s Churchill huffs and puffs his cigar less showily than fans of scenery-chewing will expect.
    Armond White, National Review, 19 Jan. 2018
  • Donald huffs in disgust, saying that Melania is hotter than any of them, and who needs this?
    Nell Scovell, HWD, 12 Oct. 2017
  • Deadpool, more than any other Marvel Comics hero, huffs the fumes of plot dadaism, which fits Wilson's eff-the-world attitude to a tee.
    Sam MacHkovech, Ars Technica, 17 May 2018
  • Some of you reading this are suddenly huffing and puffing, shocked that Hamilton was bumped from the list.
    Chris Quinn, Editor, cleveland, 14 Dec. 2019
  • Indeed, the goddess’s garb gave newspapers across the land something to huff and/or snicker about.
    Greg Daugherty, Smithsonian, 9 Feb. 2017
  • Embrace that and stand up for it without huffing the spray paint that everyone else is huffing.
    Heather Havrilesky, The Cut, 26 June 2017
  • Photographers hauling gear huffed their way up the stairs.
    Maura Judkis, Washington Post, 12 Sep. 2023
  • Others might huff and puff, but there’s no blowing this house down, or swaying Van Noten from following his heart.
    Vogue, 12 Oct. 2017
  • Stray doesn’t need to push the point that the wild dogs are welcomed more freely than these painfully young men, who huff glue and sell packets of Kleenex to get by while being denied work permits.
    Alison Willmore, Vulture, 5 Apr. 2021
  • The man was huffing keyboard duster spray on a bus before he was removed by transit employees in the 500 block of East Silver Spring Drive.
    Tyler Langan, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 24 Jan. 2018
  • As Trevor comes huffing and puffing up the stairs, Marni walks into the pristinely white apartment, darkened now because in the Mediterranean style, all the shutters are latched.
    Mary Morris, The Atlantic, 11 Mar. 2018
  • Arenado scored easily and Parra huffed into third base on what was ruled a triple.
    David Waldstein, New York Times, 14 May 2016
  • The more intractable source of local pollution is the plume of diesel exhaust from the 65 trucks that show on up on the first day after a long weekend, pause to get weighed and scanned, then drop their load and huff off to the next shift.
    Curbed, 12 Aug. 2022
  • That day ended on a pontoon boat, in front of cliffs turned molten by the setting sun, hippos yawning and huffing all around while a small group of us drank gin and tonics and learned the names of the birds feeding on the shore.
    Joel Lovell, Condé Nast Traveler, 28 Mar. 2017
  • Difluoroethane is a gas often used in cans of compressed air, which can be huffed to produce a high, while alprazolam is the generic form of brand-name Xanax.
    Daniela Avila, Peoplemag, 28 Apr. 2023
  • Mimicking the movements of a human being, Baris huffs and puffs, its body subtly lurching up and down a few times — an indicator of fatigue.
    NBC News, 20 May 2020
  • But the way Clattenburg was hailed as someone at the apex of the profession was a reminder of how primitive on-field officials can seem, huffing to and fro, eyeballing things in real time.
    Hua Hsu, The New Yorker, 30 Mar. 2017
  • In one sense, the automobile has been a remarkably stable concept since the Patent-Motorwagen huffed out from Karl Benz's workshop back in 1886.
    Car and Driver, 30 June 2015
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huff

2 of 2 noun
  • The hike is short and steep, about a mile out and back, a huff and a puff.
    Tom Stienstra, San Francisco Chronicle, 13 May 2021
  • But the two fight before that can happen, and Dan leaves in a huff.
    Bill Goodykoontz, The Arizona Republic, 2 July 2021
  • From afar, my wife, Dana, and I must have looked like hotel guests in a huff.
    Darrell Hartman, Condé Nast Traveler, 29 Sep. 2020
  • But a weeknight huff was enough to send me straight back to the Left Bank with visions of Provence.
    Chloe Schama, Vogue, 13 July 2020
  • In other words: Don’t get in a huff about these choices.
    Washington Post, 27 Jan. 2022
  • At one point, fed up with the nagging, Mr. Green left in a huff and drove his Corvette into the country to think.
    Marc Myers, WSJ, 25 Jan. 2022
  • So Lynn leaves in a huff, and Jim runs after her, and then almost gets run down by a car.
    Jordan Runtagh, PEOPLE.com, 12 Oct. 2021
  • But not to get his attention, and not in a huff — but instead just to get some sleep.
    Carolyn Hax, Washington Post, 12 Nov. 2019
  • This prompted the institute to back out of the conference in a huff.
    Damon Linker, The Week, 29 Sep. 2021
  • Maddie took off in a huff, dashing down the busy New York City sidewalk.
    Katherine Reynolds Lewis, The Cut, 17 Apr. 2018
  • The joyride ended with a walk down the tunnel in a huff, the seething noticeable in Jonathan Quick’s waddle.
    Curtis Zupke, latimes.com, 23 Oct. 2017
  • The hat floated to the United Center rafters, prompting Moffat to leave the arena in a huff.
    Phil Rosenthal, chicagotribune.com, 29 Oct. 2019
  • After Meg leaves the stranger's residence in a huff, Harry heads to the house and hits the motherlode.
    Matt Cabral, EW.com, 28 Oct. 2021
  • Then a few more, closer each time, and finally a loud huff just beyond the nylon walls of the tent.
    Washington Post, 9 Dec. 2021
  • Imagine seeing characters in a play argue to the point where one of them walks off in a huff...
    Christopher Arnott, courant.com, 9 Aug. 2021
  • The professor says something callous; the student throws a glass of water in his face and leaves in a huff.
    Michael Phillips, chicagotribune.com, 6 Feb. 2018
  • Copeland’s mother, on the other hand, wasn’t happy with his decision and walked off in a huff.
    Britni Danielle, Essence.com, 8 Feb. 2018
  • Denied a chance for leave for new chances of glory, Mahrez is in a huff with Leicester and absent from full duties.
    USA TODAY, 8 Feb. 2018
  • Eventually, a series of people would call until the person in charge got on the phone in a huff.
    Andy Kessler, WSJ, 25 Mar. 2018
  • Iphigenia was sent to her death to make amends for the slaying of a stag dear to the heart of Artemis, who, in a proverbial huff, halted the winds and stalled the onset of the Trojan War.
    Washington Post, 5 Dec. 2021
  • And that culminated on Saturday in a huff and a puff, when the desire to fight on collapsed.
    Gordon Monson, The Salt Lake Tribune, 11 Nov. 2020
  • The uninvited visitor surveyed the room and left in a huff.
    New York Times, 23 Mar. 2022
  • These threats consistently sound hollow, like the Big Bad Wolf vowing to huff and puff and blow a little pig’s house in when the abode is made of brick.
    Lionel Shriver, Harper's magazine, 10 Apr. 2019
  • The man ultimately left in a huff, with no refund, no cheese and his bag of cubed squash, Dator tweeted.
    Mark Price, charlotteobserver, 26 July 2017
  • Skiles quit in a huff in 2016 and was eventually proven right when the Magic dumped Payton this season.
    George Diaz, OrlandoSentinel.com, 15 Apr. 2018
  • No threat of eviction Just beyond the limits of the Durango park, a train slices through the mountain view with a harmonic huff.
    Sarah Matusek, The Christian Science Monitor, 10 Jan. 2022
  • And my lungs huff, voicing their regret at my choice to bum a loose cigarette on Saturday night.
    James Lynch, Popular Mechanics, 29 Apr. 2019
  • One example is quitting in a huff three weeks before your options vest.
    Neil Senturia, sandiegouniontribune.com, 22 May 2017
  • And as the line dwindled to the door, there wasn’t so much as an inconvenienced huff nor puff issued from a ticketholder entering anywhere near us.
    Kelly Dearmore, Dallas News, 2 Sep. 2021
  • The huff of this retarding barrier has given way to the romantic memory of unscheduled clapping eyes on and waving hi from behind the glass to peers and old friends.
    Scott Roxborough, The Hollywood Reporter, 9 Feb. 2022

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