interminable
adjective
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We promise not to ramble on endlessly about the origins of interminable. This word was borrowed into English in the 15th century, from a Latin word combining the prefix in- ("not") and the verb terminare, meaning "to terminate" or "to limit." Interminable describes not only something without an actual end (or no end in sight, such as "interminable traffic"), but also events, such as tedious lectures, that drag on in such a way that they give no clear indication of ever wrapping up. Some relatives of interminable in English include terminate, determine, terminal, and exterminate.
Examples of interminable in a Sentence
Emma Green, New Yorker, 15 Oct. 2025
Baseball had become interminable.
—Mark Leibovich, The Atlantic, 8 Oct. 2025
Hoping to better understand the demand for smutty scares, Hitchcock and his wife, Alma Reville (Olivia Williams), spend an interminable evening at the theater surrounded by people throwing popcorn and making out while the topless woman onscreen is tortured and killed in a masked man’s dungeon.
—Ben Travers, IndieWire, 4 Oct. 2025
Even for Premier League clubs, €75million is a lot of money, and even after some interminable negotiations with Galatasaray, Napoli weren’t budging on their price.
—Nick Miller, New York Times, 1 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for interminable
Cite this Entry
“Interminable.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/interminable. Accessed 30 Oct. 2025.
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interminable
adjective
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