unimaginable
63
5.4
- adjective
- /ˌʌnɪˈmædʒɪnəbl/
:
inimaginable
- The rescue team faced an unimaginable challenge when they entered the collapsed building to save those trapped inside.
- almost unimaginable
- unimaginable ways
- unimaginable a decade ago
He was doing unimaginable things to me all while I slept.
- He was doing unimaginable things to me all while I slept.
- It can explode your life in unimaginable ways.
- It's difficult, it's tough, it's gruelling, It's unimaginable to anybody that doesn't operate in those realms.
- So this is bloodshed of an almost unimaginable scale.
- And I think somebody who is born into just unimaginable amounts of trauma, that's ruthless.
- I hate that the beauty I love about this life exists amidst such unimaginable cruelty.
- When I tell you, Shannon, it's a love that is unexplainable and unimaginable.
- I know I know it's it's unimaginable so much harder.
- I want you to imagine you've now lost your child unimaginable way as well.
Examples
-
These killed children had survived unimaginable trauma.
-
Small networks of angry people can inflict unimaginable harm on the rest of the world.
Academic text (2002) -
You know, already things that we thought unimaginable are are happening.
-
And so the deal she made me is unimaginable power.
-
Well, we're getting married in three days, and I have done everything to make the day absolutely perfect, but the unimaginable has happened.
-
Dear Robert, from the moment mom brought you into this world, you have given me unimaginable joy.
-
But what started out as a dream soon turned into an unimaginable nightmare.
-
For the Americans, it would be a disaster of almost unimaginable proportions.
-
Over the last several months, several things have occurred that heretofore would have been unimaginable.
Academic text (2015) -
For thousands of years, your family has selflessly guarded the world from an unimaginable evil.
Synonyms
∞
3.5
Very surprising or hard to believe
432
4.9
Very surprising and almost impossible to accept as true
89
5.7
Impossible to imagine or accept as an option
46
7.4
Impossible to imagine or believe
26
7.0
Not likely to be true or hard to believe
21
5.4
So wonderful or strange that words cannot show it
8
9.5
So great that words cannot describe it
3
7.5
A feeling so strong that you cannot describe it in words
Antonyms
How Imaginable
793
1.0
98
3.7
62
3.6
487
1.9
63
5.4
46
7.4
Surface Forms
Morphology
unimaginable = imaginable (transparent) = un + imagine + able
Formed by standard negation of the adjective 'imaginable' (itself 'imagine' + -able), so the meaning is directly derivable by learners.
Etymology
Unimaginable is made from un- 'not' and imagine 'to make a picture in your mind', like the familiar word image. So something unimaginable is 'not able to be pictured', which is why we use it for things that are beyond belief or very hard to imagine.