sketch

American  

[skech] / skɛtʃ /

noun

sketches plural

1. a simply or hastily executed drawing or painting, especially a preliminary one, giving the essential features without the details.

2. a rough design, plan, or draft, as of a book.

   Synonyms:

   outline

3. a brief or hasty outline of facts, occurrences, etc..

   a sketch of his life.

4. a short, usually descriptive, essay, history, or story.

5. a short play or slight dramatic performance, as one forming part of a vaudeville program.

   Synonyms:

   routine, act, skit

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verb (used with object)

sketches, present (3rd person singular) sketched, past participle, past sketching present participle

1. to make a sketch of.

   Synonyms:

   represent, delineate, design, outline, draw

2. to set forth in a brief or general account.

   He sketched his own part in the affair.

3. Metallurgy. (in a steel mill or the like) to mark (a piece) for cutting.

verb (used without object)

sketches, present (3rd person singular) sketched, past participle, past sketching present participle

1. to make a sketch or sketches.

sketch British  

/ skɛtʃ /

noun

1. a rapid drawing or painting, often a study for subsequent elaboration

2. a brief usually descriptive and informal essay or other literary composition

3. a short play, often comic, forming part of a revue

4. a short evocative piece of instrumental music, esp for piano

5. any brief outline

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verb

1. to make a rough drawing (of)

2. to make a brief description of

Usage

What is a basic definition of sketch? A sketch is a drawing or painting that is usually made quickly and lacks finer details. Sketch is also used to mean to create a sketch of something. A sketch can also be a short dramatic performance. Sketch has a few other senses as a verb and a noun. Most artists begin with a sketch, or many sketches, before they work on what will be the final product, such as an oil painting. For example, cartoonists will often make a sketch of a new character without colors, shading, or detailed lines so they can get feedback before putting in too much effort. A painter may draw a sketch of landscape with colored pencils so they can figure out the best colors and shades that would go well together.

• Real-life examples: Many artists would be happy to draw a sketch of something for you if you pay them the right price. Police will often create a sketch of a suspect based on a witness’s description of them. You can find many early sketches of famous characters like Mickey Mouse and SpongeBob SquarePants on the internet.
• Used in a sentence: The artist made several sketches of the model before beginning his work on the elaborate portrait. 

In this same sense, sketch is used as a verb to mean to draw a sketch of something.

• Used in a sentence: I sketched a cat in my notebook during the boring lecture. 

A sketch is also a short dramatic performance, especially one that is part of a comedy show. Comedic performances that consist solely of a collection of short, humorous stories are known as sketch comedy.

• Real-life examples: Saturday Night Live, The Kids in the Hall, Monty Python’s Flying Circus, and Sesame Street are television programs that all use sketches.
• Used in a sentence: Chris Farley was in most of my favorite sketches from Saturday Night Live.

Synonym Usage

See depict.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• sketcher
  noun
• resketch
  verb (used with object)
• sketchable
  adjective
• sketchlike
  adjective
• unsketched
  adjective
• well-sketched
  adjective
• sketchingly
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• sketches
  plural

Participles

• sketching
  present
• sketched
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• sketch
  simple
• sketches
  simple
• have sketched
  perfect
• has sketched
  perfect
• am sketching
  progressive
• are sketching
  progressive
• is sketching
  progressive
• have been sketching
  perfect progressive
• has been sketching
  perfect progressive

Past

• sketched
  simple
• had sketched
  perfect
• was sketching
  progressive
• were sketching
  progressive
• had been sketching
  perfect progressive

Future

• will sketch
  simple
• will have sketched
  perfect
• will be sketching
  progressive
• will have been sketching
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of sketch

1660–70; < Dutch schets (noun) ≪ Italian schizzo < Latin schedium extemporaneous poem, noun use of neuter of schedius extempore < Greek schédios

Explanation

A sketch is a rough or brief outline of something. If you hand in a sketch, instead of your full paper, don't expect to get a very high grade! The word sketch can be used when talking about something visual, particularly a drawing. An artist might sketch a friend in an hour, and then go home and take weeks to complete the portrait. A sketch can also refer to a short verbal or narrative account. You might want to give your friend a brief sketch of what happened to you today, instead of boring her with every last detail, including the hours you spent washing and then folding your laundry.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

sketch sketches sketched sketching

Max Frumes and Sujeet Indap sketch the shifting alliances and blustering personalities that made this one of the most notorious Chapter 11 cases of the 21st century.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 27, 2026

Like your tax-filing status, what matters for general advice is a sketch of your situation, not the name of the company you work for or your exact salary.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 22, 2026

The actor was joined by Molly Shannon, his former ‘Saturday Night Live’ castmate, in a sketch, and a long-running gag with Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith continued.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 16, 2026

I don’t want to fat-shame anybody, but it reminds me a lot of the Monty Python Meaning of Life sketch where the guy says the weight for him blows up.

From Slate ● Jul. 12, 2026

I moved to stand, but Connor took my arm and pointed to a sketch he’d been working on.

From "Willodeen" by Katherine Applegate

They are preserved within one bound volume of 41 sketches.

From BBC ● Jul. 17, 2026

All the while, he and creative partner Cooper Tomlinson were trialling content online, mixing comedy sketches on TikTok and Instagram with horror shorts such as "The Chair" on their YouTube channel "That's a Bad Idea".

From Barron's ● Jul. 17, 2026

Since 2016, they’ve been digitizing Saar’s expansive archive, including correspondence, sketches, playbills, documents and ephemera.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 15, 2026

In this collection of sketches, filled with guilt and shame, pride and love, Mr. Coppola finds the meaning he craves.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 9, 2026

Before long, she was collecting again, adding text and sketches to her study book.

From "The Girl Who Drew Butterflies: How Maria Merian's Art Changed Science" by Joyce Sidman

According to Terekh, the first ideas for what would become the FP-1 drone were sketched on a napkin in their favourite restaurant in late 2022.

From Barron's ● Jul. 24, 2026

Director Craig Gillespie is no stranger to turbulent filmmaking, and his “Cruella” commendably made an underserved villain into a fully sketched character, without overrelying on callbacks.

From Salon ● Jun. 27, 2026

It glides by smoothly, and Ms. Mann’s lilting, melancholy songs are hypnotically lovely, but the characters’ anguish and psychological distress are only faintly sketched in.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 5, 2026

He sketched an idea on the back of his nine-year-old daughter's homework, he says, and soon showed it to an architect, partly expecting him to "laugh me out of the room".

From BBC ● Jun. 3, 2026

How suddenly she’d sketched out an entire future for Beatrice and herself.

From "Secrets at Sea" by Richard Peck

For years following, back in the U.S., he traveled up and down the Eastern seaboard sketching or painting as many of the signers as were still to be found.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 4, 2026

Partis was also sketching the heron as he watched.

From BBC ● Jun. 9, 2026

But the 41-year-old's womenswear collection in September didn't convince everyone, and some observers expect him to put a more decisive mark on Dior and cement the new identity he's begun sketching out.

From Barron's ● Jan. 19, 2026

“Eddie just kept sketching and drawing,” Morris says.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 22, 2025

Dr. Trefusis sat amidst the tumult, sketching a snakeskin.

From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume I: The Pox Party" by M.T. Anderson

Related Words

• account
• blueprint
• cartoon
• chart
• copy
• depiction
• description
• illustration
• likeness
• painting
• picture
• piece
• portrayal
• summary
• version
• vignette