fallback
Americannoun
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an act or instance of falling back.
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something or someone to turn or return to, especially for help or as an alternative.
His teaching experience would be a fallback if the business failed.
adjective
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of fallback
1750–60, noun, adj. use of verb phrase fall back
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
They should be required to publish their resolution sources, document fallback procedures, and monitor markets for upstream tampering and coordinated narrative attacks tied to large open positions.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 5, 2026
Unified is exploring an idea to create regional hubs at which parents could drop off students — as a fallback for families with no other child-care options, according to sources with knowledge of the planning.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 7, 2026
That means when fertilizer prices jump, corn becomes the more expensive bet and soybeans the cheaper fallback.
From Barron's ● Mar. 31, 2026
"Urban households may be more exposed to fuel shortages than rural areas, as they have fewer immediate fallback options," said Vibha Dhawan, director general at the Energy and Resources Institute in Delhi.
From BBC ● Mar. 19, 2026
And if that career didn’t work out, I could use my fallback career as an astronaut.
From "Thirteen Reasons Why" by Jay Asher
By now, though, many have exhausted those fallbacks and fallen into debt.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 5, 2023
The two medications had been the the backbone of antibody treatment, and doctors were hard pressed to come up with fallbacks when they didn’t work against omicron.
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 10, 2022
Software companies know full well that almost no one reads these things, so they know they can safely stuff all the legal fallbacks they wish into their texts.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 11, 2020
And the usual fallbacks when stage shows are scarce — television, film, even waiting tables — are unavailable during this phase of the pandemic.
From New York Times ● May 7, 2020
He added that “even with the fallbacks, we are not sure we’ll have enough to get to Sunday of this week.”
From Fox News ● Apr. 20, 2020
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
