1,400 new words in our dictionary! — Parasocial, glow-up, promposal & more
1,400 new words in our dictionary! — More

bottleneck 1 of 3

noun

Definition of bottlenecknext
as in jam
a crowded mass (as of cars) that impedes or blocks movement a bottleneck inevitably forms at the start of a construction zone when the highway narrows from three to two lanes

Synonyms & Similar Words

Relevance

bottleneck

2 of 3

adjective

as in linear

Related Words

Dissimilar Words

bottleneck

3 of 3

verb

as in to dam

Related Words

Dissimilar Words

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of bottleneck
Noun
Days ahead of Xi’s visit to the US, Huawei also announced that its next generation of Ascend AI chips would be released ahead of schedule next year, signaling progress in what has been a crucial bottleneck for China in AI development. — Simone McCarthy, CNN Money, 23 Sep. 2026 That blank‑slate approach created drag—an information bottleneck that slowed everything down and left too much room for noise and error. — Alec Litowitz, Fortune, 15 Sep. 2026
Verb
The demand for slots skyrocketed and the auction prices ballooned in recent weeks as a standoff between the Iran and the United States over access to the strait kept traffic bottlenecked. — Alma Solís, Los Angeles Times, 28 Apr. 2026 Yet, sparse computations on the CPU are often bottlenecked by the indirect lookups used to find nonzero data. — Olivia Hsu, IEEE Spectrum, 28 Apr. 2026 See All Example Sentences for bottleneck
Recent Examples of Synonyms for bottleneck
  1. jam
  2. linear
  3. dam
  4. congestion
  5. compressed
  6. clog
  7. tight
  8. hinder
Noun
  • Wednesday evening’s Office Hours, a weekly jazz jam hosted at Vine Street Brewing, has turned a typically slow night in the service industry into one of their busiest nights of the week.
    — Katelyn Umholtz, Kansas City Star, 22 Sep. 2026
  • Order one with jam and butter, or go savory and get a biscuit topped with vegetarian gravy or stuffed with bacon, lettuce and tomato.
    — Catherine Garcia, TheWeek, 21 Sep. 2026
Definition of jam
Adjective
  • That’s one romantic notion of many in a free-floating relationship drama, which employs an intuitively non-linear structure to enliven what is otherwise a fairly conventional, ordinary love story between two attractive but imperfect people.
    — Guy Lodge, Variety, 25 Sep. 2026
  • The northern bypass channel will be 3,900 linear feet long and 300 feet wide at the bottom, according to the Army Corps.
    — Emily Holshouser, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 24 Sep. 2026
Definition of linear
Verb
  • Mormon Flat, which dams Canyon Lake, was constructed in 1925, and is one of SRP’s oldest dams.
    — Sarah Henry, AZCentral.com, 18 Sep. 2026
  • According to the Louisville Zoo, after many Kentucky and Indiana streams were dammed decades ago, water health has declined at the expense of local ecosystems, putting pressure on the struggling salamanders.
    — Ruby Grisin, Louisville Courier Journal, 18 Sep. 2026
Definition of dam
Noun
  • View gallery - 12 images Replacing short car trips with an electric scooter is one of the quickest ways to trim daily commuting costs, avoid traffic congestion, and skip the search for parking.
    — New Atlas, New Atlas, 22 Sep. 2026
  • Public addresses City Council about I-77 NCDOT plans to add toll lanes to an 11-mile stretch of I-77 from uptown to the South Carolina border in an effort to ease congestion.
    — Charlotte Observer, Charlotte Observer, 22 Sep. 2026
Definition of congestion
Adjective
  • Minimalist fiction is characterized by direct, highly compressed, densely allusive language.
    — Anna Mebel, JSTOR Daily, 17 Sep. 2026
  • Many new comedies these days suffer from a compressed run that offers little room to riff and experiment.
    — Alison Herman, Variety, 8 Sep. 2026
Definition of compressed
Verb
  • And in Red Oak, Texas, where Villegas lives, construction workers' cars clog the roads for miles before dawn.
    — Norah O'Donnell, CBS News, 20 Sep. 2026
  • In extreme situations, the flies can clog radiators, causing cars to overheat.
    — Karen Brewer Grossman, Southern Living, 17 Sep. 2026
Definition of clog
Adjective
  • But she is locked in a tight race against Tejano musician Bobby Pulido.
    — Hailey Bullis, The Washington Examiner, 19 Sep. 2026
  • Over a tight five-day timeline — as Marnus and Ilse finish school ahead of the December holidays, and the family prepares for their summer vacation — these various tensions impact one another in tacit but perhaps terminal ways.
    — Guy Lodge, Variety, 19 Sep. 2026
Definition of tight
Verb
  • Arrivals at the show were hindered by a combination of fans waiting to catch a glimpse of front-row guests like Monica Bellucci and Italian singer Jovanotti, and an anti-fur protest.
    — ABC News, ABC News, 24 Sep. 2026
  • Sandra Mayson, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania who has researched the effects of pretrial detention, agreed that the move could hinder detainees’ ability to prepare their defense.
    — Reed Williams, AJC.com, 23 Sep. 2026
Definition of hinder

Browse Nearby Words

bottle-feeds
bottleneck
bottlenecked
See all Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“Bottleneck.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/bottleneck. Accessed 26 Sep. 2026.

Copy Citation
Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

Popular in Grammar & Usage

See More

Do You Need a New Language Peeve?

More Commonly Mispronounced Words

Why do we use apostrophes to show possession?

Merriam-Webster’s Great Big List of Words You Love to Hate

'A' or 'an'? What about before 'h'? An Indefinite Article Guide
See More

Popular in Wordplay

See More

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't

Back to School Vocabulary

14 Phobias You Probably Haven't Heard Of

The Words of the Week - Sept. 25
See More

Popular

See More

Do You Need a New Language Peeve?

The Longest Long Words List

9 Words That Sound Like Insults But Aren't
See More

Games & Quizzes

See All
Play Quordle: Guess all four words in a limited number of tries. Each of your guesses must be a real 5-letter word.
Quordle Can you solve 4 words at once?
Play Blossom: Solve today's spelling word game by finding as many words as you can using just 7 letters. Longer words score more points.
Blossom Pick the best words!
Play Missing Letter: a crossword with a twist. Each of the 25 puzzle words start with a different letter of the alphabet. Which letter is missing?
The Missing Letter A daily crossword with a twist
image of the words cracker fly and sale arranged in a triangle with the word fire in the middle
Triple Play Quiz Find the word that pairs with each of the three g...
See All