1
as in sterile
not able to produce fruit or offspring
most mules are impotent
Synonyms & Similar Words
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
2
as in helpless
unable to act or achieve one's purpose
an impotent ruler who was just a figurehead
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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of impotent
Even in places that offer highly advanced health care, doctors have felt impotent trying to undo the damage when these horrors return.
—
Patricia Callahan, ProPublica, 19 Mar. 2026
This unsettling thriller about impotent (emotionally, literally) university professor Ali (Turkish star Ekin Koç), on the path to vengeance after the suspicious death of his mother, scored strong reviews (including my own) and the World Cinema Directing Award out of the Utah festival.
—Ryan Lattanzio, IndieWire, 14 Nov. 2025
Yet the Jets' offense was again impotent.
—Andrew Greif, NBC news, 19 Oct. 2025
Ethics without efficiency are impotent.
—Karlo Tanjuakio, Forbes.com, 29 Aug. 2025
See All Example Sentences for impotent
Patricia Callahan, ProPublica, 19 Mar. 2026
This unsettling thriller about impotent (emotionally, literally) university professor Ali (Turkish star Ekin Koç), on the path to vengeance after the suspicious death of his mother, scored strong reviews (including my own) and the World Cinema Directing Award out of the Utah festival.
—Ryan Lattanzio, IndieWire, 14 Nov. 2025
Yet the Jets' offense was again impotent.
—Andrew Greif, NBC news, 19 Oct. 2025
Ethics without efficiency are impotent.
—Karlo Tanjuakio, Forbes.com, 29 Aug. 2025
See All Example Sentences for impotent
Recent Examples of Synonyms for impotent
Adjective
-
The sterile flies are irradiated and released en masse, designed to blanket a region experiencing an outbreak.—
Evan Bush,
NBC news,
7 June 2026
-
American officials are working to expand the use of sterile male screwworm flies to stop the parasites’ spread.—
Eduardo Cuevas,
USA Today,
6 June 2026
Adjective
-
The child was helpless against the power of the surging surf, injured while tossed by the waves.—
Laylan Connelly,
Oc Register,
4 June 2026
-
American society—grotesquely unequal and divided, helpless before its demagogic and oligarchic manipulators—is no longer a stranger to the dark ambiguities of lopsided economic progress.—
Wyatt Williams,
Harpers Magazine,
2 June 2026
Adjective
-
In a barren free-agent class, though, that’s much easier said than done.—
Shayna Goldman,
New York Times,
2 June 2026
-
Called me barren and used up and all that.—
Jamil Jan Kochai,
New Yorker,
1 June 2026
Adjective
-
Hollywood on a bad day is paralyzed, absolutely paralyzed, and incapable of making new decisions.—
Benjamin VanHoose,
PEOPLE,
5 June 2026
-
One of the bullets hit the teen’s spine, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down, his mother said.—
Julian Roberts-Grmela,
New York Daily News,
5 June 2026
Adjective
-
As the story goes, attendance was weak, the weather was bad, and the tournament experience was just lacking.—
James Burky,
Denver Post,
29 May 2026
-
As many as 40 states combine one-party control with institutional barriers weak enough to fall to political pressure.—
Bruce Sibley,
Time,
29 May 2026
Cite this Entry
“Impotent.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/impotent. Accessed 9 Jun. 2026.
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