make headway


Advance, make progress, as in We haven't made any headway with this project. This expression, first recorded in 1887, uses headway in the nautical sense of “a vessel's forward movement.”

Words Nearby make headway

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

How to use make headway in a sentence

  • The fact that Henry had been the first to make headway with the dog fancier, had not escaped him.

    The Box-Car Children | Gertrude Chandler Warner
  • With this success our efforts to make headway on the peninsula practically came to an end.

  • We were absolutely unable to make headway in the inky blackness which now reigned, so we got under some thick trees and sat down.

    13 Days | John Alan Lyde Caunter
  • She had given up trying to make headway in the fog, and was coming to anchor just above us.

    Virginia: The Old Dominion | Frank W. Hutchins and Cortelle Hutchins