play out

1. 1.

   deplete

   “exhaust one's savings”

   “We quickly played out our strength”

   Synonymsrun downexhaustsaptire

   Broaderconsume
2. 2.

   perform or be performed to the end

   “How will the election drama be played out?”

   Broaderperform
3. 3.

   play to a finish

   “We have got to play this game out, even thought it is clear that we have last”

   Broaderplay

   game

4. 4.

   become spent or exhausted

   “The champion's strength played out fast”

   Broaderchange

Questions about play out

What does play out mean?

play out means "deplete". That is the primary sense; the word has 4 in total, listed in full on this page.

What is another word for play out?

Close synonyms include run down, exhaust, sap, tire. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is play out a common word?

play out is banded "Familiar" — widely understood, used when the subject calls for it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.