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Synonyms

pipe dream

1 American  

noun

  1. any fantastic notion, hope, or story.

    Her plans for a movie career are just a pipe dream.
pipe-dream 2 American  
[pahyp-dreem] / ˈpaɪpˌdrim /

verb (used without object)

pipe-dreamed, pipe-dreamt, pipe-dreaming

  1. to indulge in pipe dreams; fantasize.

pipe dream British  

noun

  1. a fanciful or impossible plan or hope

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
pipe dream Idioms  

  1. A fantastic notion or vain hope, as in I'd love to have one home in the mountains and another at the seashore, but that's just a pipe dream. Alluding to the fantasies induced by smoking an opium pipe, this term has been used more loosely since the late 1800s.

Etymology

Origin of pipe dream

An Americanism dating back to 1895–1900

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.

When Koy was moving up the comedy ranks under his real name Joseph Glenn Herbert, the thought of calling himself a comedian felt like a pipe dream.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 5, 2026

The lessons of 1986 show that with the right setting and right leaders, a Reykjavik moment isn’t a pipe dream.

From Slate • Feb. 2, 2026

That, of course, As usual, that was a pipe dream.

From Salon • Jan. 13, 2026

David Goldwyn, head of Goldwyn Global Strategies and a former Obama administration official, said it may be a pipe dream to expect oil companies to risk large sums on turning around Venezuela.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 9, 2026

That old image of myself as a hero, as a man of conscience and courage, all that was just a threadbare pipe dream.

From "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien

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.