pin down
phrasal verbpin somebody down
- to make somebody unable to move by holding them with a lot of force
- Two men pinned him down until the police arrived.
- He was pinned down on the floor.
Want to learn more?
Find out which words work together and produce more natural sounding English with the Oxford Collocations Dictionary app.
- to find somebody and make them answer a question or tell you something you need to know
- I need the up-to-date sales figures but I can never pin him down at the office.
pin somebody down (to something/doing something)
- to make somebody make a decision or say clearly what they think or what they intend to do
- It's difficult to pin her down to fixing a date for a meeting.
pin something down
- to explain or understand something exactly
- The cause of the disease is difficult to pin down precisely.
- The difference between the two approaches is hard to pin down precisely.