as in dream
a conception or image created by the imagination and having no objective reality
opening our own restaurant has long been a pipe dream
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Recent Examples of pipe dream
The stalker pipe dreams need to stop here.
—
Micah McCartney, MSNBC Newsweek, 5 Nov. 2025
Friends called it a pipe dream.
—Matthew Sedacca, Curbed, 5 Nov. 2025
Expecting it to be now seems like a pipe dream.
—Jace Frederick, Twin Cities, 17 Oct. 2025
Dozens of companies are now competing to make the world’s first viable humanoid robot, convinced that recent advances in AI have made what was once a pipe dream into achievable reality.
—Billy Perrigo, Time, 14 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for pipe dream
Micah McCartney, MSNBC Newsweek, 5 Nov. 2025
Friends called it a pipe dream.
—Matthew Sedacca, Curbed, 5 Nov. 2025
Expecting it to be now seems like a pipe dream.
—Jace Frederick, Twin Cities, 17 Oct. 2025
Dozens of companies are now competing to make the world’s first viable humanoid robot, convinced that recent advances in AI have made what was once a pipe dream into achievable reality.
—Billy Perrigo, Time, 14 Oct. 2025
See All Example Sentences for pipe dream
Recent Examples of Synonyms for pipe dream
Noun
-
Sadly, his college ball dreams didn’t come to fruition after the coach who called him up retired.—
Marina Watts,
PEOPLE,
13 Jan. 2026
-
Over the past seven years, Blake Lively brought her dream hair care line to life by redefining the beauty industry with a blend of passion, precision and purpose.—
Kanika Talwar,
Footwear News,
13 Jan. 2026
Noun
-
Most of them are unemployed and produce nothing but illusions.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
15 Jan. 2026
-
Then, style the cut with a deep side part to create the illusion of an asymmetrical blunt cut.—
Elise Tabin,
InStyle,
14 Jan. 2026
Noun
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Bob Weir, the singer, songwriter, guitarist, and co-founder of the Grateful Dead, whose songs about sunshine daydreams and truckin’ helped turn the jam band into a 60-year musical empire, has died at age 78.—
Richard Gehr,
Rolling Stone,
10 Jan. 2026
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Season 5, after all, is framed by Mike and Eleven’s daydream of a conversation in the first episode.—
Ben Travers,
IndieWire,
26 Dec. 2025
Noun
-
More elite than university even, the boarding school occupies a fantasy space in the writer’s imagination, making novels about them a tantalizing glimpse into another world.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
16 Jan. 2026
-
In his director’s statement, Edwin describes the film as an attempt to merge horror with dark comedy and surreal fantasy while confronting labor exploitation and dehumanizing working conditions.—
Naman Ramachandran,
Variety,
15 Jan. 2026
Noun
-
The vision, however, was as crucial as the sound, and the vision was as yet inchoate, embryonic.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
15 Jan. 2026
-
In any other news cycle, Disney locking horns with Google would have dominated, but such was the gravity of the Mouse House’s OpenAI agreement, that the battle was somewhat in peripheral vision.—
Jake Kanter,
Deadline,
14 Jan. 2026
Cite this Entry
“Pipe dream.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/pipe%20dream. Accessed 17 Jan. 2026.
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