demo
noun
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demo
1 American
[dem-oh]
/ ˈdɛm oʊ /
noun
-
demos
plural
-
a recording of a new song or of one performed by an unknown singer or singing group, distributed to disc jockeys, recording companies, etc., to demonstrate the merits of the song or performer.
-
He does flooring and demo for a living.
verb (used with object)
demoed,
demoing
-
to try out or exhibit the use of (a product, process, or the like).
You can demo the game without downloading or buying it.
-
to record (a song) to demonstrate the merits of the song or performer.
Demo
2
American
[dem-oh]
/ ˈdɛm oʊ /
noun
Informal.
-
Demos
plural
demo-
3
American
demo
1
British
/ ˈdɛməʊ /
noun
-
short for demonstration
-
-
a demonstration record or tape, used for audition purposes
-
a demonstration of a prototype system
-
-
short for demonstrator
demo-
2
British
combining form
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of demo1
1935–40; by shortening; see -o
Origin of Demo2
An Americanism dating back to 1785–95
Origin of demo-3
< Greek dēmo-, combining form of dêmos
Explanation
A demo is what you give to show how something works. You might give a demo of your fancy new espresso machine to your weekend guests, so they'll know how to use it. Demo is short for demonstrate or demonstration. It can be a verb, as when a tech company demos its new tablet or laptop. It's also a noun: "The demo of that software was pretty interesting." In the music industry, a demo is a practice version of a song, meant to show a record label or music venue what a performer's music sounds like. This meaning's been around since the 1960s, while earlier it meant "a political demonstration."
Vocabulary lists containing demo
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.
See Examples For:
In a demo, the robot was shaky and slow, with laundry getting stuck on its claw-like hands.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 20, 2026
“Wonderful World” was a demo that Keen Records put on a shelf.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 2, 2026
How about building a website and selling the demo directly to fans?
From BBC ● Jun. 26, 2026
McPeake noted that the company sold a $332,000 system to an unnamed “large financial institution” last year and conducted a live cybersecurity demo at a conference in March.
From Barron's ● Jun. 15, 2026
“Raske is the better demo man—” Inej began.
From "Six of Crows" by Leigh Bardugo
It received a Best Paper Honorable Mention recognition, while a demo of the research team's broader robotic feeding system received a Best Demo Award.
From Science Daily ● May 9, 2024
A nationwide campaign, known as the Flower Demo, was launched by activists to show solidarity with sexual assault survivors.
From BBC ● Jun. 6, 2023
Demo sessions began at Lanois’ makeshift studio in a converted movie theater in Oxnard, not far from Dylan’s home on Malibu’s Point Dume.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 26, 2023
So while sitting last month in Father Demo Square, in Manhattan’s West Village, Brookshire took advantage.
From New York Times ● Dec. 6, 2022
Demo notched an arrow to his bow, drove it through the right rear tire of the vehicle.
From The Tarn of Eternity by Frank Tymon
Telis Demos is a writer for Heard on the Street and is co-host of The Wall Street Journal’s Take on the Week, a weekly podcast about markets and finance.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 15, 2026
Demos, presentations and meetings will take place in a massive convention center as well as ballrooms and suites throughout the city.
From Barron's ● Jan. 3, 2026
Demos recorded at that time got the attention of Steve Allen, who put her on his prime-time television variety show.
From New York Times ● Mar. 15, 2023
Heather McGhee, the former president of progressive think tank Demos, wrote about this phenomenon in her book “The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together.”
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 27, 2023
Virginia Demos, who teaches psychology at Harvard, recalls having long conversations with Tomkins during the 1988 Democratic National Convention.
From "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell
With its young band cutting demos on a four-track cassette recorder, “Nimrods” could have been set in 2026, 1996 or 1976 — phones and social media are practically nonexistent in the plot.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 5, 2026
He founded the Modern Lovers in 1970 in Natick, Mass., and recorded demos in 1971 and ’72.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 22, 2026
"I went to London and one of the first demos I recorded was Lost in France and then I was on Top Of The Pops."
From BBC ● Jul. 9, 2026
That leaves investors with a clearer path than the headlines suggest: own the platform for versality and flexibility, screen the suppliers for revenue, avoid paying up for the humanoid demos.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 1, 2026
This being a direct rather than a representative democracy, membership of the demos, or sovereign body, was by right rather than by election, and every decision was taken on a one-man, one-vote basis.
From "Words Like Loaded Pistols" by Sam Leith
When Musk returned to the stage a year later, he demoed a prototype called Bumblebee, with visible wires and actuators.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 3, 2026
GoDaddy demoed the AI app builder, agentic workflows for core small and midsize customers, and Airo for WordPress professionals.
From Barron's ● Dec. 6, 2025
This is an enormous deal, and we know this because we just demoed it with Twitter, and it was 100 times worse than you thought it’d be.
From Slate ● Nov. 6, 2025
Both nominations recognise Now and Then, a song that John Lennon demoed in the 1970s, and which was finally completed by his surviving bandmates Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr last year.
From BBC ● Jan. 31, 2025
Wright demoed the songs from the “Dream Weaver” LP on an array of then-novel electronic instruments, which he’d gotten interested in shortly before leaving Spooky Tooth.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 5, 2023
At the Times Food Stage, Cassandra Peterson, known for her work as Elvira, will be demoing from her book “Elvira’s Cookbook From Hell.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 11, 2026
That's what researchers demoing experimental tech at Warwick University's Festival of Innovation are hoping to find out.
From BBC ● Jan. 31, 2025
In a third, Jonathan Shobrook, a fellow, was demoing his product, Adrenaline, a tool that lets you ask natural-language questions of your code base.
From New York Times ● May 31, 2023
In exchange for demoing, I'd get free unlimited yoga classes.
From Salon ● Mar. 31, 2023
But despite repeatedly demoing a system for consumer headsets, it never got hardware makers like Oculus and HTC to sign on, so almost nobody in the VR world could use it.
From The Verge ● Dec. 20, 2019
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.
