unbridgeable

American  

[uhn-brij-uh-buhl] / ˌʌnˈbrɪdʒ ə bəl /

adjective

1. not able to be crossed, joined, or closed by a bridge; extremely wide or far apart.

2. irreconcilable.

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Explanation

Something that's unbridgeable is hopeless — it can't be solved or made smaller, like the sometimes unbridgeable gap between two rival political parties. You'll almost always find this adjective accompanied by words like gap or divide. You might describe the unbridgeable communication gap between you and your parents or an unbridgeable difference between how much houses cost in a town and the income of most residents. A river that's too wild or prone to flooding for a bridge to cross it is quite literally unbridgeable, from the verb bridge, "build a bridge over."

Example Sentences

Indeed, a key reason Powell pushed back so bluntly against expectations of such a cut at the press conference that day was to manage a committee riven by seemingly unbridgeable differences.

From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 12, 2025

Two years on, that gap remains frustratingly unbridgeable.

From BBC • Feb. 8, 2025

All human societies will have deep, perhaps even unbridgeable differences.

From Slate • Jul. 15, 2024

We’ve grown accustomed to our divides, which many of us see as unbridgeable.

From Seattle Times • Jan. 5, 2024

When I graduated four years later and did not enter Harvard or any other medical school but became a carpenter and climbing bum instead, the unbridgeable gulf between us widened.

From "Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer