Idiom idiom
winnow down
Meaning
To reduce the number of candidates for something by judging their quality and rejecting some.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“We need to winnow down the list of candidates to three people.”
“The committee spent all afternoon reviewing applications to winnow down the pool of applicants for the final interview stage.”
“After evaluating the vast array of proposals, the board sought to winnow down the options to those that best aligned with their long-term strategic objectives.”
Anchors to
Last updated August 10, 2026