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• ping-pong
  ping-pong

  verb (used with object)

  to move back and forth or transfer rapidly from one locale, job, etc., to another; switch.
• Ping-Pong
  Ping-Pong

  table tennis.

ping-pong

¹ American  

[ping-pong, -pawng] / ˈpɪŋˌpɒŋ, -ˌpɔŋ /

verb (used with object)

1. to move back and forth or transfer rapidly from one locale, job, etc., to another; switch.

   The patient was ping-ponged from one medical specialist to another.

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verb (used without object)

1. to go back and forth; change rapidly or regularly; shift; bounce.

   For ten years the foreign correspondent ping-ponged between London and Paris.

Ping-Pong ² American  

[ping-pong, -pawng] / ˈpɪŋˌpɒŋ, -ˌpɔŋ /

Trademark.

1. table tennis.

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Ping-Pong British  

/ ˈpɪŋˌpɒŋ /

noun

1. Also called: ping pong.  another name for table tennis

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Etymology

Origin of ping-pong

First recorded in 1900–05

Example Sentences

Chalamet’s marketing deck is full of outrageous, sky-high ideas, like an orange blimp that drops ping pong balls as it sails over Los Angeles.

From Salon • Dec. 25, 2025

Here, Chalamet again fuses his personal drive into his performance, claiming that he spent seven years training to play ping pong like Reisman and unlike Tom Hanks in “Gump,” he’s doing his own stunts.

From Los Angeles Times • Dec. 23, 2025

An American Airlines pilot, Ron Weiland was 54 years old and in good physical shape when he mysteriously lost his ability to play ping pong.

From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 22, 2025

Conservative peer Lord Sharpe, the shadow business and trade minister, had tabled an amendment to the Employment Rights Bill during its latest stage of parliamentary ping pong in the House of Lords.

From BBC • Dec. 16, 2025

At last the people seized upon ping pong, and it became common.

From As A Chinaman Saw Us Passages from his Letters to a Friend at Home by Gratton, Henry Pearson