play around

Idioms

Act playfully or irresponsibly, especially in having a casual or extramarital sexual relationship. For example, She got tired of his playing around and filed for divorce. [1920s]

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.

"We are two men of 80 years of age, so we cannot play around with democracy," he said.

From Barron's • Feb. 22, 2026

Elsewhere in Gabland: It was reported that Gabbard “obtained” voting machines from Puerto Rico to play around with them and look for security vulnerabilities.

From Slate • Feb. 7, 2026

The Social Security Administration can give you estimates as to what benefits would be at different ages, and offers benefit calculators to let you play around with the numbers.

From MarketWatch • Dec. 13, 2025

Power users agree it is often more effective to invest in training a primary AI assistant than to play around with many tools that never build big enough sample sizes to understand your preferences.

From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 6, 2025

“Do they play around here? We should go see them.”

From "A Heart in a Body in the World" by Deb Caletti

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023