clean sweep
Americannoun
-
an overwhelming or decisive victory, as by a political candidate who wins in all or almost all election districts.
-
the winning of all the prizes, rounds, contests, etc., in a competition or of all the games in a series.
-
a thorough or sweeping change, especially one effected by the large-scale removal or elimination of unwanted persons or things.
The new president made a clean sweep when he joined the company, replacing all the department heads.
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.
This is largely the same side that went out of the T20 World Cup in the group stage 20 months ago and one that suffered that embarrassing Ashes clean sweep.
From BBC ● Jul. 5, 2026
The quartet restored some pride on Tuesday after a clean sweep of 10 defeats for home players on Monday.
From BBC ● Jun. 30, 2026
Bordeaux Begles' demolition job over Leinster completed the European clean sweep for French men's rugby teams.
From BBC ● May 23, 2026
Nvidia’s sales growth isn’t slowing soon, but round two of the AI hardware battle—the inference phase—might not be the clean sweep for Nvidia that round one was.
From Barron's ● Mar. 18, 2026
It will be one clean sweep, left to right.
From "An Ember in the Ashes" by Sabaa Tahir
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
