as in mysterious
impossible to understand
advanced scientific theories of ungraspable complexity for the layperson
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
Antonyms & Near Antonyms
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 ungraspable
Paul’s attachments are ungraspable, transient, and forever underwritten by raw desire.
—
Vlada Gelman, TVLine, 27 Jan. 2025
Eraserhead was so ungraspable, so far into left field, that most critics dismissed it at the time.
—Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter, 3 Sep. 2019
One gazes into the geographical expanse of this place to try to grasp the ungraspable scale of things.
—Andrew Cockburn, Harper’s Magazine , 5 Jan. 2023
It’s a megagenre, something the poet-philosopher Timothy Morton might call a hyperobject, ungraspable in its ubiquity and scale.
—Virginia Heffernan, WIRED, 13 Dec. 2022
The scope of something inexpressible, a mammoth, ungraspable intimation, had overtaken him.
—Greg Jackson, The New Yorker, 22 Nov. 2021
The ecological relationships that Darwin brings to our attention tell us of a world of bonds much more complex and ungraspable than had ever previously been supposed.
—Longreads, 23 Mar. 2021
The Internet of Things is an ungraspable future, particularly when the fact of a future for Earth at all sometimes sounds implausible.
—Kaitlyn Tiffany, The Atlantic, 14 May 2020
The river itself was a standard-issue metaphor of time’s ungraspable flux and constancy.
—Wells Tower, Outside Online, 11 July 2018
Vlada Gelman, TVLine, 27 Jan. 2025
Eraserhead was so ungraspable, so far into left field, that most critics dismissed it at the time.
—Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter, 3 Sep. 2019
One gazes into the geographical expanse of this place to try to grasp the ungraspable scale of things.
—Andrew Cockburn, Harper’s Magazine , 5 Jan. 2023
It’s a megagenre, something the poet-philosopher Timothy Morton might call a hyperobject, ungraspable in its ubiquity and scale.
—Virginia Heffernan, WIRED, 13 Dec. 2022
The scope of something inexpressible, a mammoth, ungraspable intimation, had overtaken him.
—Greg Jackson, The New Yorker, 22 Nov. 2021
The ecological relationships that Darwin brings to our attention tell us of a world of bonds much more complex and ungraspable than had ever previously been supposed.
—Longreads, 23 Mar. 2021
The Internet of Things is an ungraspable future, particularly when the fact of a future for Earth at all sometimes sounds implausible.
—Kaitlyn Tiffany, The Atlantic, 14 May 2020
The river itself was a standard-issue metaphor of time’s ungraspable flux and constancy.
—Wells Tower, Outside Online, 11 July 2018
Recent Examples of Synonyms for ungraspable
Adjective
-
Scientists will use this data to study dark matter and dark energy, which make up most of the universe but remain mysterious.—
Kurt Knutsson,
FOXNews.com,
14 July 2025
-
Modern courtship is already a nightmare, but director Christopher Landon (of Happy Death Day) ups the stakes when a woman (Meghann Fahy) receives a series of mysterious and threatening AirDrops during her date.—
Savannah Salazar,
Vulture,
12 July 2025
Adjective
-
And as the discourse around it keeps stacking up, what started as a silly turn of phrase has devolved into an incomprehensible mess that’s preventing people from noticing the much more insidious shift around them.—
CT Jones,
Rolling Stone,
11 July 2025
-
This is because for the first Daemon X Machina, the story was an incomprehensible mess.—
Ollie Barder,
Forbes.com,
9 June 2025
Adjective
-
Blakely, along with 26 other Camp Mystic girls and counselors, perished in the deluge – forcing her family to endure yet another unfathomable tragedy.—
Pamela Brown,
CNN Money,
18 July 2025
-
But Aicher’s message got through: This wasn’t a pickle, this was a full-fledged disaster, unfolding with unfathomable fury.—
Mirjam Swanson,
Oc Register,
11 July 2025
Adjective
-
There is also a slightly uncanny aspect to FedEx that felt fitting.—
Cressida Leyshon,
New Yorker,
20 July 2025
-
Not so long ago in a living room not too far away, an uncanny replica of K-2SO stands at seven-feet tall in front of Ermer Twano’s television set.—
Olivia Petty,
San Diego Union-Tribune,
18 July 2025
Adjective
-
As satire, Next to Heaven is unintelligible, as though someone is universalizing their own hangups and then skewering them for clout.—
Book Marks
June 20,
Literary Hub,
20 June 2025
-
Filled with uncanny creatures and unintelligible language, the book's inspiration came, Serafini muses, either from aliens, or his cat.—
David Morgan,
CBS News,
30 May 2025
Adjective
-
Riddle has done that in part by embracing the community that sees her as a way into a complicated and sometimes deliberately impenetrable sport.—
Caoimhe O'Neill,
New York Times,
10 July 2025
-
When selecting a provider, organizations should remember to look for one that offers robust data protection offerings that ensure the storage sets are impenetrable.—
Dave Friend,
Forbes.com,
27 June 2025
Adjective
-
At first, users had to type to do things with files and programs, using esoteric commands to navigate up and down the directory structures that contained them.—
Ian Bogost,
The Atlantic,
14 July 2025
-
After Congress reversed course on accountability in 2015, results for everyone got worse, even as progressive jurisdictions started adopting increasingly esoteric equity strategies.—
Matthew Yglesias,
Boston Herald,
9 June 2025
Adjective
-
Chartreuse Made by actual French monks based on a nearly 300-year-old secret recipe, this high-proof, kelly green spirit is a bit of an obscure flex.—
Amiel Stanek,
Bon Appetit Magazine,
11 July 2025
-
Outraged, Gauguin located an obscure French law that proved only children within a four-kilometre radius of a school were bound to attend.—
Alexandra Schwartz,
New Yorker,
11 July 2025
Cite this Entry
“Ungraspable.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/ungraspable. Accessed 24 Jul. 2025.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
Share