tenterhooks
IdiomsExample Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Is it why markets are rocking, why oil shipments are cut back from the Strait of Hormuz, why the world hangs on tenterhooks of suspense over what happens next?
From Slate ● Mar. 4, 2026
For PSG, the fans will be on tenterhooks until the very end in their bid for a top-eight finish.
From Barron's ● Jan. 20, 2026
Back in the current Archers timeline, fans were left on tenterhooks by the cliffhanger broadcast on New Year's Eve, when a dramatic attack shook the village.
From BBC ● Dec. 31, 2025
As a way to find joy, she said, in a time when news and world events have us all on tenterhooks.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 26, 2025
Yet Bloom and his wife had existed on tenterhooks with each other for years now.
From "The Milagro Beanfield War" by John Nichols
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.
