How to Use insidious in a Sentence

insidious

adjective
Definition of insidiousnext
Synonyms for insidiousnext
  • Most people with this insidious disease have no idea that they are infected.
  • These kinds of myths can have deeply harmful and insidious effects on how people treat those who have this condition.
    — Amy Marturana Winderl, SELF, 17 Aug. 2020
  • The reality turned out to be both more banal and perhaps more insidious.
    — Seema Jilani, The New York Review of Books, 18 Aug. 2020
  • Alas, this technology has an insidious, racist legacy all its own.
    — Theodore Kim, Scientific American, 18 Aug. 2020
  • Yet the assumption behind this softer and more insidious version is that no one disagrees to begin with.
    — Greg Weiner, National Review, 10 Sep. 2020
  • That skepticism undermines confidence in medicine and poses an insidious threat to public health efforts.
    — Dallas News, 20 Sep. 2020
  • On was years ahead of its time in portraying the insidious nature of cultural appropriation and class conflict, and the way white privilege blinds so many to the world around them.
    — Anne Cohen, refinery29.com, 21 Aug. 2020
  • Now, in place of this brute force approach, a more insidious, calculated reengineering of Hong Kong is underway.
    — Timothy McLaughlin, Wired, 17 Sep. 2020
  • Family secrets are so insidious; please don’t perpetuate this.
    — Amy Dickinson, oregonlive, 13 Aug. 2020
  • Some were duped by false scientific claims into paying thousands of dollars for classes in the organization’s insidious pyramid scheme.
    — Sarah Midkiff, refinery29.com, 23 Aug. 2020
  • The first, and perhaps most insidious type of fear is in the sphere of our self.
    — Nell Derick Debevoise, Forbes, 27 Feb. 2021
  • And the virus, as the Wall Street Journal put it, is insidious.
    — Andrew Mark Miller, Washington Examiner, 17 Nov. 2020
  • This feeling is a form of self-doubt and one of the most insidious forms.
    — Kevin Kruse, Forbes, 4 Oct. 2024
  • Even so, there are insidious flashes of wit to the way that M3GAN speaks.
    — Owen Gleiberman, Variety, 4 Jan. 2023
  • The most insidious form of oppression is that which comes at the hands of your own.
    — Janice Gassam Asare, Forbes, 28 Jan. 2022
  • The efforts were large and small, from the insidious to old-fashioned dirty tricks.
    — Washington Post, 17 Feb. 2018
  • More insidious is moisture that opens the door to mildew.
    — Popmech Editors, Popular Mechanics, 21 Nov. 2019
  • The story kind of starts to have this insidious effect on you.
    — Roxanne Fequiere, ELLE, 5 Dec. 2022
  • That was what was so insidious about the process, Albury thought.
    — New York Times, 1 Sep. 2021
  • In the calmest, most insidious way, Dorothy had been kidnapped.
    — Hadley Meares, Los Angeles Magazine, 7 June 2018
  • With the insidious nature of this thing, any of us could fall victim.
    — Gordon Monson, The Salt Lake Tribune, 14 Sep. 2020
  • Now the town is known for something much more insidious.
    — Ann Killion, SFChronicle.com, 3 Aug. 2019
  • One of the most insidious parts of this, for me, has been that, on the days that are better, the physical relief cedes space to self-doubt.
    — Anna Altman, The New Republic, 17 Feb. 2021
  • This recipe is more insidious because, Nadine points out, the ants walk all over it, then take it back to their nest.
    — Isabel Garcia, House Beautiful, 7 Feb. 2020
  • The first is the ongoing insidious change to an ever-warmer world.
    — Jim Williams, Star Tribune, 16 Feb. 2021
  • But this time, as one of the most racist and insidious laws ever created in this country was passed, the leagues slept.
    — Mike Freeman, USA TODAY, 29 Mar. 2021
  • Eating ice would be just one of the many insidious symptoms that would take over my life throughout the next year.
    — L'oréal Blackett, refinery29.com, 19 Sep. 2024
  • The twice-monthly mahjong game also fell victim to the insidious virus.
    — oregonlive, 9 June 2021
  • But as many lives as this insidious virus has taken, and will take in the months to come, heart disease will inevitably take more.
    — Fortune, 17 Nov. 2020
  • Beyond the dangers of floodwaters and hurricane-force winds, people likely face many more insidious health risks in the aftermath of a storm.
    — Justine Calma, The Verge, 2 Oct. 2024

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'insidious.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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