captive audience

Idioms  

1. Listeners or onlookers who have no choice but to attend. For example, It's a required course and, knowing he has a captive audience, the professor rambles on endlessly. This expression, first recorded in 1902, uses captive in the sense of “unable to escape.”

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

captive audience

"It's worth it for the banks, because they then have a captive audience, who are more likely to take other products from them."

From BBC ● Aug. 16, 2026

The streaming wars peaked during the pandemic, with Americans a captive audience for two years.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 14, 2026

“If we go for a walk, he’s a captive audience, but it’s been below zero here. So sometimes, I’ll interrupt ‘Jeopardy,’” she said.

From MarketWatch ● Feb. 10, 2026

They wanted a captive audience for long enough to lay out their case for change.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 8, 2025

“Don’t feel bad, friends.We couldn’t have said no to what they asked us to do,” Bruce said, slowly raising his eyes to gaze at his captive audience again.

From "The Kill Order (Maze Runner, Book Four; Origin)" by James Dashner