trailblaze
Americanverb (used with object)
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to blaze a trail through (a forest, wilderness, or the like) for others to follow.
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to be a pioneer in (a particular subject, technique, etc.).
verb (used without object)
Usage
What does trailblaze mean? To trailblaze is to literally make a trail where there wasn’t one, such as through a forest or an area of wilderness. In a figurative sense, it means to be the first (or one of the first) to do something, which allows others to follow in that “path” and build on that progress. The metaphorical meaning of trailblaze is much more common, and the noun trailblazer is more common than the verb. Example: Her book trailblazed a new kind of young adult fiction.
Etymology
Origin of trailblaze
Back formation from trailblazer
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:
To trailblaze and succeed in the harsh EV market, the company decided it needed a presence in California, as well as near the traditional heart of car building in and around Detroit.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 31, 2025
I got updates that said any teachers who want to try and do online classes can trailblaze how to figure that out.
From Slate ● May 2, 2020
I have to trailblaze and do this on my own.
From Salon ● Dec. 2, 2018
As the journalist Patrick Kingsley observes in his new book … ‘It takes young, mobile risk-takers to trailblaze a new route.’
From Washington Post ● Feb. 23, 2017
As the journalist Patrick Kingsley observes, in his new book, “The New Odyssey: The Story of the Twenty-First-Century Refugee Crisis,” “It takes young, mobile risk-takers to trailblaze a new route.”
From The New Yorker ● Feb. 19, 2017
“Anne trailblazed that path for so many women, and beautifully captured the essence of people and what it meant to be human,” said daughter Gwendolyn Derk, a physician who lives near Portland, Ore.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2023
The Ellon-based company has trailblazed a crowdfunding model since it was launched in Fraserburgh in 2007 by Mr Watt and co-founder Martin Dickie.
From BBC ● Jun. 21, 2022
In retrospect, the pairing couldn’t have been more felicitous, because McNally’s plays about the gay experience — especially “Love! Valour! Compassion! — trailblazed for “The Inheritance.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 8, 2019
"Shonda certainly trailblazed a lot of this current move in so many different ways," says Larry Wilmore.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 28, 2015
That contrasts sharply with the US, which trailblazed the concept of crime mapping by allowing third-party developers to use crime data published by local police forces to map reports of incidents.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 2, 2011
Already England’s top-rated female player, the prodigy secured the title in a dramatic rapid-chess playoff—adding to a trailblazing run that already included defeating multiple grandmasters.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 14, 2026
A trailblazing engineer, she is the first woman to lead one of the world’s major oil companies.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 27, 2026
Smack in the middle of sensation and observation is Mary Harron’s trailblazing debut film, “I Shot Andy Warhol,” released 30 years ago this month, with a timely restoration rolling out theatrically this summer.
From Salon ● Apr. 29, 2026
Yet, it’s true: Several trailblazing Black astronauts stayed aboard for several days while helping build the ISS on space shuttle missions.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 30, 2026
Thomas Jones was a Confederate Secret Service veteran who had spent his entire life trailblazing through the fields, thickets, and forests of rural Maryland and navigating its streams, marshes, and rivers.
From "Chasing Lincoln's Killer" by James L. Swanson
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.
