"spray and pray" meaning in English

See spray and pray in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Forms: sprays and prays [present, singular, third-person], spraying and praying [participle, present], sprayed and prayed [participle, past], sprayed and prayed [past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|spray<> and pray<>}} spray and pray (third-person singular simple present sprays and prays, present participle spraying and praying, simple past and past participle sprayed and prayed)
  1. (informal) To dispense anything (such as bullets or advertising) in an uncoordinated manner, hoping to reach the desired target through luck. Tags: informal Related terms: fire and forget, shotgun approach

Download JSONL data for spray and pray meaning in English (1.9kB)

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "sprays and prays",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "spraying and praying",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "sprayed and prayed",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "sprayed and prayed",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "spray<> and pray<>"
      },
      "expansion": "spray and pray (third-person singular simple present sprays and prays, present participle spraying and praying, simple past and past participle sprayed and prayed)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English coordinated pairs",
          "parents": [
            "Coordinated pairs",
            "Terms by etymology"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with language name categories using raw markup",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
          "parents": [
            "Terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To dispense anything (such as bullets or advertising) in an uncoordinated manner, hoping to reach the desired target through luck."
      ],
      "id": "en-spray_and_pray-en-verb-4i4wbsKs",
      "links": [
        [
          "dispense",
          "dispense"
        ],
        [
          "bullet",
          "bullet"
        ],
        [
          "advertising",
          "advertising"
        ],
        [
          "uncoordinated",
          "uncoordinated"
        ],
        [
          "target",
          "target"
        ],
        [
          "luck",
          "luck"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(informal) To dispense anything (such as bullets or advertising) in an uncoordinated manner, hoping to reach the desired target through luck."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "fire and forget"
        },
        {
          "word": "shotgun approach"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "informal"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "spray and pray"
}
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "sprays and prays",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "spraying and praying",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "sprayed and prayed",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "sprayed and prayed",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "spray<> and pray<>"
      },
      "expansion": "spray and pray (third-person singular simple present sprays and prays, present participle spraying and praying, simple past and past participle sprayed and prayed)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "fire and forget"
    },
    {
      "word": "shotgun approach"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English coordinated pairs",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English entries with language name categories using raw markup",
        "English informal terms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English rhyming phrases",
        "English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys",
        "English verbs"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To dispense anything (such as bullets or advertising) in an uncoordinated manner, hoping to reach the desired target through luck."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "dispense",
          "dispense"
        ],
        [
          "bullet",
          "bullet"
        ],
        [
          "advertising",
          "advertising"
        ],
        [
          "uncoordinated",
          "uncoordinated"
        ],
        [
          "target",
          "target"
        ],
        [
          "luck",
          "luck"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(informal) To dispense anything (such as bullets or advertising) in an uncoordinated manner, hoping to reach the desired target through luck."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "informal"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "spray and pray"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-06-27 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-06-20 using wiktextract (0f7b3ac and b863ecc). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.