1
a
: a predicament affording no obvious escape
b
: deadlock
2
: an impassable road or way : cul-de-sac
Synonyms
Examples of impasse in a Sentence
The players are poised to strike after Thursday's games because they believe, with good reason, that if no agreement is reached by the end of the post-season, the owners will declare an impasse …
—
Murray Chass, New York Times, 9 Aug. 1994
We seem to have been forced into an impasse. We need to understand why space-time singularities have the structures that they appear to have; but space-time singularities are regions where our understanding of physics has reached its limits.
—Roger Penrose, The Emperor's New Mind, 1989
I think the civil rights movement in its early and middle years offered the best way out of America's racial impasse: in this society, race must not be a source of advantage or disadvantage for anyone.
—Shelby Steele, Harper's, June 1988
An arbitrator was called in to break the impasse.
She had reached an impasse in her career.
Murray Chass, New York Times, 9 Aug. 1994
We seem to have been forced into an impasse. We need to understand why space-time singularities have the structures that they appear to have; but space-time singularities are regions where our understanding of physics has reached its limits.
—Roger Penrose, The Emperor's New Mind, 1989
I think the civil rights movement in its early and middle years offered the best way out of America's racial impasse: in this society, race must not be a source of advantage or disadvantage for anyone.
—Shelby Steele, Harper's, June 1988
An arbitrator was called in to break the impasse.
She had reached an impasse in her career.
Recent Examples on the Web
There was a brief period in late 2019 where the two entities reached an impasse about the future of the character in the MCU, and their agreement was temporarily called off.
—Katcy Stephan, Variety, 9 Sep. 2024
The spat’s timing is terrible for consumers, the result of an impasse that came after the companies haggled for weeks over the carriage fees Disney receives for its programming.
—Ryan Faughnder, Los Angeles Times, 4 Sep. 2024
Fundamentally, the impasse is due to divided control of Congress, with Democrats narrowly controlling the Senate while the GOP holds a single-digit edge in the House—and some members of the GOP caucus believe the party should use the process to push for spending cuts.
—Sara Dorn, Forbes, 19 Sep. 2024
DirecTV on Saturday reached a carriage renewal with Disney after a 13-day outage, with the impasse highlighting its challenges as a pure-play video provider.
—Dade Hayes, Deadline, 16 Sep. 2024
See all Example Sentences for impasse 
Katcy Stephan, Variety, 9 Sep. 2024
The spat’s timing is terrible for consumers, the result of an impasse that came after the companies haggled for weeks over the carriage fees Disney receives for its programming.
—Ryan Faughnder, Los Angeles Times, 4 Sep. 2024
Fundamentally, the impasse is due to divided control of Congress, with Democrats narrowly controlling the Senate while the GOP holds a single-digit edge in the House—and some members of the GOP caucus believe the party should use the process to push for spending cuts.
—Sara Dorn, Forbes, 19 Sep. 2024
DirecTV on Saturday reached a carriage renewal with Disney after a 13-day outage, with the impasse highlighting its challenges as a pure-play video provider.
—Dade Hayes, Deadline, 16 Sep. 2024
See all Example Sentences for impasse
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'impasse.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Dictionary Entries Near impasse
Cite this Entry
“Impasse.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/impasse. Accessed 5 Oct. 2024.
Copy CitationKids Definition
Legal Definition
impasse
noun
im·passe
ˈim-ˌpas, im-ˈpas 
: a point in especially labor negotiations at which reaching an agreement is impossible because neither party is willing to compromise or change position
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