one-upmanship

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.

That kind of provocative behavior will lead to years, even a lifetime, of one-upmanship, backbiting and behind-the-scenes maneuvers.

From MarketWatch • Nov. 3, 2025

The resulting game of financial one-upmanship has tied the fates of the world’s biggest semiconductor and cloud companies—and vast swaths of the U.S. economy—to OpenAI, essentially making it too big to fail.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 21, 2025

The skyscape of this city is peppered with examples of architectural “I’ll go higher still” one-upmanship.

From BBC • Sep. 26, 2024

In an interview with The Associated Press last month, she’d said that building relationships with small Pacific nations shouldn’t become a game of one-upmanship with China.

From Seattle Times • Jan. 18, 2023

Fear, uncertainty, and one-upmanship became key ingredients of this new approach to warfare.

From "Spies: The Secret Showdown Between America and Russia" by Marc Favreau