pathbreaking
Americanadjective
-
pertaining to blazing a trail or path.
-
pioneering; innovative.
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.
In a message to Gap employees, Chief Executive Richard Dickson called Fisher “a pathbreaking entrepreneur at a time when that was highly unusual for women.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 4, 2026
A pathbreaking European banking merger is meanwhile gathering steam.
From Barron's ● Mar. 30, 2026
Judy Pace, a pathbreaking model and star of “blaxploitation” films who appeared in television shows through the 1960s and ’70s and the hit made-for-TV movie “Brian’s Song,” died last week at age 83.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 16, 2026
There has been no great frisson of ideas, no proud democratic exercise, no pathbreaking consensus.
From Slate ● Mar. 5, 2024
In a volley of pathbreaking papers published between 1986 and 1990, Nüsslein-Volhard and her colleagues definitively identified several of the factors that provide the signal for “headness” and “tailness” in the embryo.
From "The Gene" by Siddhartha Mukherjee
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.
