How to Use plain in a Sentence

plain

1 of 3 adjective

• What he said is a lie, plain and simple.
• It was a plain room with no curtains.
• She was wearing plain black shoes.
• He printed the picture on plain paper.
• You don't have to call me Mr. Johnson—just plain Fred will be fine.
• That's a – that's a plain fact that no one can dispute.
  — Liz Cheney, CBS News, 7 Jan. 2024
• That, more than anything, is what the mug shot makes plain.
  — Jason Parham, WIRED, 28 Aug. 2023
• This is on the Chief Justice to solve, plain and simple.
  — Justin Elliott, ProPublica, 4 May 2023
• And the quick contrast of an eclipse makes this effect plain to see.
  — Ashley Strickland, CNN, 6 Apr. 2024
• Alek Wek emerged first, wearing a plain Thom Browne suit and a head scarf.
  — Rachel Syme, The New Yorker, 18 Sep. 2023
• One was clearly the patch in their card, the other a plain piece of white fabric.
  — Daniel Miller, Los Angeles Times, 14 Mar. 2024
• Start with a plain green T-shirt and matching leggings or a skirt.
  — Katie Bowlby, Country Living, 30 July 2023
• To us, gray and plain and empty has a certain beauty to it.
  — Nicholas Bell, SPIN, 5 May 2023
• Draw targets on a plain t-shirt and dip the Q-Tips in food coloring.
  — Leah Campano, Seventeen, 8 Apr. 2023
• Fill in with plain orange pumpkins and lanterns filled with small gourds.
  — Sarah Martens, Better Homes & Gardens, 19 Sep. 2023
• The view is a slice of plain Queens life, hazed and softened like a pleasant memory.
  — Justin Davidson, Curbed, 20 Sep. 2023
• Meals were small portions of plain spaghetti, tortillas, and rice and beans.
  — Mary Beth Sheridan, Washington Post, 19 Sep. 2023
• Wear it on its own, or throw on a plain black blazer and pair it with black tights for a warmer, complete look.
  — Stephanie Osmanski, Southern Living, 2 Dec. 2023
• That said, a plain glass of water isn’t your only option.
  — Julia Ries, SELF, 19 Oct. 2023
• Eco-friendly or not, the king's coronation day look was far from plain.
  — Chelsey Sanchez, Harper's BAZAAR, 8 May 2023
• In terms of sugar, many recipes keep it simple with plain white sugar.
  — Sam Burros, Peoplemag, 18 Sep. 2023
• Beijing’s hypocrisy and the distance between its rhetoric and deeds are also plain to see.
  — Alexander Gabuev, Foreign Affairs, 9 Apr. 2024
• Broken tree limbs make adorable accents for plain white shelves.
  — Mary Cornetta, Better Homes & Gardens, 4 Mar. 2024
• There were shiny marble floors, plain white walls, and a faux-stone spiral slide cascading down to the pool.
  — ELLE Decor, 7 June 2023
• So probably a skirt or plain pants, a kind of flowy top, and jewelry.
  — Lynn Trenning - Correspondent, Charlotte Observer, 30 Jan. 2024
• Little did anyone know that the suit had been hiding in almost plain sight for decades — and was about to be found again.
  — David Browne, Rolling Stone, 20 July 2023
• And then there’s the beauty of Chopin —the plain power of his music and his highly memorable melodies.
  — Vulture Staff, Vulture, 20 Oct. 2023
• And if that's still too plain, maybe grab this multi-colored straw tote instead.
  — Alyssa Grabinski, Peoplemag, 5 Apr. 2023
• Purchase plain cork coasters, or cut squares from a sheet of thin cork and help the kids decorate them with acrylic paint.
  — Emily Vanschmus, Better Homes & Gardens, 14 June 2023
• Use the ghosts to decorate a plain table runner or glue them to pumpkins.
  — Charlyne Mattox, Country Living, 21 June 2023

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plain

2 of 3 noun

• The plain is marked by hills, rivers and small lakes and tundra.
  — Bybecky Bohrer, Fortune, 7 Sep. 2023
• The plain is marked by hills, rivers, and small lakes and tundra.
  — Becky Bohrer and Matthew Daly, The Christian Science Monitor, 7 Sep. 2023
• The Plastics and their tactics are meant to be as feral as the African plains.
  — Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 10 Jan. 2024
• The route out of the capital passed through the flat desert plain surrounding Qom.
  — Azadeh Moaveni, The New Yorker, 7 Aug. 2023
• In the later image, fresh lava had spewed to form a new plain.
  — Shi En Kim, Smithsonian Magazine, 14 Feb. 2024
• The departure adds to questions about the prospects for oil drilling in the refuge’s 1.6 million-acre coastal plain.
  — Alex Demarban, Anchorage Daily News, 23 Aug. 2022
• Outside the city, on the broad and dusty plain of the pampas, is the landscape that provides the country its power.
  — Noah Gallagher Shannon, New York Times, 5 Oct. 2022
• On the back side of the storm, across the plains of South Dakota and Nebraska, heavy snow is possible.
  — Kenton Gewecke, ABC News, 23 Dec. 2023
• The bison roam the plains, so take caution when driving, and do not approach them.
  — Amanda Ogle, Travel + Leisure, 3 June 2023
• The year is 1857; the place, the scorching, sparsely populated plains of Texas.
  — Allison Robicelli, Washington Post, 21 June 2023
• Thank god nice moments like this still happen on this cursed plain.
  — Serena Dai, Bon Appétit, 19 Dec. 2022
• The sunset sets beautifully over the plain before the stars burn bright.
  — Cnt Editors, Condé Nast Traveler, 21 June 2023
• Delhi and much of the Indo-Gangetic plain saw clear skies between April and June 2020.
  — Manavi Kapur, Quartz, 22 Nov. 2021
• Two friends separate, with one of them living in the plains and the other going to live in the mountains.
  — New York Times, 4 May 2023
• Drained lake basins make up more than half of the Arctic coastal plain, the part of the Alaska map that most resembles Swiss cheese.
  — Ned Rozell, Anchorage Daily News, 20 Aug. 2022
• It was also concentrated more in the plains and the Midwest.
  — Nbc Universal, NBC News, 10 Sep. 2023
• The main seller is the natural plain, (Driftless) and that’s my favorite.
  — Kristine M. Kierzek, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 28 Mar. 2022
• Making the movie left the duo laboring for 100 days in the oppressive heat of the Oklahoma plains.
  — Jazz Tangcay, Variety, 22 Feb. 2024
• In between the two in size is silt, a mix of rock dust and minerals often found in fertile flood plains.
  — Brian Darby, Discover Magazine, 29 Mar. 2024
• Beavers waddled the Texas coastal plain at least 22 million years ago and are found through most of eastern Texas today.
  — Adithi Ramakrishnan, Dallas News, 28 Mar. 2023
• The village of Castelluccio, on a bluff overlooking the plain, was all but destroyed in 2016.
  — Julia Buckley, Travel + Leisure, 10 Sep. 2023
• Sphagnum bogs, rocky plateaus, and huckleberry plains give way to some 47 miles of trails.
  — Condé Nast, Bon Appétit, 14 Mar. 2023
• The property boasts 20 elevated rooms with views over the marula and baobab trees that dot the Tarangire plains.
  — Patricia Doherty, Travel + Leisure, 22 Aug. 2023
• Interior coastal plains are forecast to reach into the 90s, and downtown L.A. will peak in the high 80s.
  — Grace Toohey, Los Angeles Times, 6 July 2023
• But for a lo-fi bagel, the 365 plain would do well on hectic mornings, stuffed in your kid's hand before shooing them off to school.
  — Sam Stone, Bon Appétit, 27 June 2023
• The four-part carousel featured pics of a hike with Gwendolyn and Joshua, James next to his brother Jared, and two stunning sunsets over the open plain.
  — Janine Henni, Peoplemag, 8 Mar. 2023
• All occur statewide, or at least in each of our main regions — mountain, piedmont, and coastal plain.
  — Miri Talabac, baltimoresun.com, 27 Jan. 2022
• Each one started as a fragment of something else—a tiny fossil, a scrap of basalt, a shark’s tooth—that drifted down to the plain at the very bottom of the ocean.
  — WIRED, 28 Feb. 2023
• The coastal plain, which lies along the Beaufort Sea on Alaska's northeastern edge, is marked by hills, rivers and small lakes and tundra.
  — Becky Bohrer, BostonGlobe.com, 6 Sep. 2023
• However, the white paper-mache bird was actually supposed to be a greater-sage grouse – a bird that lives in the North American plains.
  — Kathleen Wong, USA TODAY, 25 Mar. 2024

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plain

3 of 3 adverb

• In the kitchen, as in life, so much is just about the plain old nuts and bolts.
  — Yotam Ottolenghi, New York Times, 16 Aug. 2023
• At nearly $1,800, the Fold is plain out of reach to many.
  — Chris Velazco, Washington Post, 10 May 2023
• Some foods are just plain lucky to eat on New Year’s Eve.
  — USA TODAY, 29 Dec. 2022
• Grilling a green bean is just plain awesome, and the idea of the sauce is a crowning moment.
  — Fred Thompson, Charlotte Observer, 30 Jan. 2024
• There’s no easy way to put it: Lower back pain just plain sucks.
  — Women's Health, 11 Feb. 2023
• Joséphine wore a plain white gown evocative of a wedding dress.
  — Nathan Smith, Smithsonian Magazine, 21 Nov. 2023
• These books range from the literary to the historical to the plain weird.
  — Jim Ruland, Los Angeles Times, 10 Mar. 2024
• Pair 'em up with your favorite high-tops to add '80s flair to a plain white sneaker.
  — Kelsey Stiegman, Seventeen, 14 July 2023
• But all that plain white plaster ends when the Boise builder opens the door to a small room seven years in the making.
  — Maria L. La Ganga, Idaho Statesman, 31 Jan. 2024
• That much will be plain enough to visitors from the outside.
  — Kriston Capps, Washington Post, 8 Dec. 2022
• Tried scooting back to the rear of the seat, but then pedaling was plain awkward.
  — Scott Kramer, Forbes, 2 Apr. 2023
• Reynolds looked cool in a dusty-green button-up layered over a plain white tee.
  — Rosa Sanchez, Harper's BAZAAR, 8 Sep. 2023
• As usual, this is clever, funny, odd, and just plain cool.
  — Phil Plait, Discover Magazine, 12 July 2012
• Just stir and a plain-old cup of joe becomes a heavenly mocha.
  — Jessica Cherner, House Beautiful, 11 Nov. 2022
• One pair will come in a plain white colorway while the other will be a brown and white cow print.
  — Kerane Marcellus, Essence, 5 Feb. 2024
• Use plain unflavored Greek yogurt to make the thick batter, then fold in the berries.
  — Chris Morris, BostonGlobe.com, 30 June 2023
• This three-pack of pure silk scrunchies protects hair from damage — and looks just plain cute, too.
  — Alesandra Dubin, Woman's Day, 27 Dec. 2022
• There is and always will be a need for a plain old bucket, regardless of the size or scope of your project.
  — Tom Price, Popular Mechanics, 15 Feb. 2023
• Some have been just plain fun, like meeting the actor Michael B. Jordan.
  — Madison Malone Kircher, New York Times, 23 Mar. 2023
• Benito wore a plain white tee, a brown jacket, black pants, and tan shoes.
  — Briannah Rivera, Seventeen, 2 May 2023
• Even the racing programs were just plain white sheet paper.
  — Stephanie Kuzydym, The Courier-Journal, 10 June 2023
• The eastern façade was left plain, to show that the building is a reconstruction.
  — Ian Johnson, The New York Review of Books, 4 May 2023
• Yeah, George, voters are just plain frustrated across the board.
  — ABC News, 5 Nov. 2023
• That’s a plain-old-modernist move, the same as marketing a car with scenes of hot people on a sweet road trip.
  — Jacob Stern, The Atlantic, 15 Dec. 2022
• Tuck a plain white pocket square into the breast pocket for a monotone look.
  — Brad Lanphear, Men's Health, 19 Aug. 2023
• This adorable novelty pillow is one of those things that’s just plain fun.
  — Samantha Booth, Rolling Stone, 21 Nov. 2023
• Two months ago, Jenner wore similar jeans and a plain white tee at…maybe this same house?
  — Elizabeth Logan, Glamour, 21 Aug. 2023
• Choose an Interesting Crib Your crib doesn't have to be plain white or wood.
  — Hadley Mendelsohn, House Beautiful, 28 July 2023
• Unlike a plain square weave pattern (one thread over, one thread under), a float means the pattern skips threads.
  — Theresa Holland, Peoplemag, 14 June 2023
• Thanks to Stone’s abundant charisma, Cruella marks one of the more memorable Disney remakes — chaotic, campy, and just plain fun.
  — Shania Russell, EW.com, 10 Mar. 2024

Last Updated: 5 Sep 2024