unchain
Americanverb (used with object)
verb
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to remove a chain or chains from
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to set at liberty; make free
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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unchainsimple
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unchainssimple
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have unchainedperfect
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has unchainedperfect
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am unchainingprogressive
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are unchainingprogressive
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is unchainingprogressive
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have been unchainingperfect progressive
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has been unchainingperfect progressive
Past
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unchainedsimple
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had unchainedperfect
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was unchainingprogressive
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were unchainingprogressive
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had been unchainingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of unchain
Explanation
To unchain is to set free by removing restraints. If you want to ride your bike, unchain it from the bike rack. And if you want your dog to fetch, unchain her so she can run. If a something is secured with chains, you'll need to unchain it to release it. A high-security prisoner will need a guard to unchain her before she can use the telephone, and workers for an animal rescue organization might unchain dogs that have been cruelly chained outdoors in the cold. Another way to unchain something is more figurative: "I always feel unchained from my obligations when school ends in the summer!"
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:
If California communities are to thrive in a future without more people, we’re going to have to figure out how to unchain ourselves from that idea.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 27, 2025
For decades, Silicon Valley futurists have sought to unchain humanity from the corporeal life cycle, viewing death as yet another transformational problem in need of a “life altering” solution.
From Washington Post ● Aug. 29, 2019
Wittman also can unchain DeJuan Blair, the free-agent signee who has been shackled to the pine for six consecutive games.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 24, 2014
And anyway, it's the same Leroy Fer who bought his girlfriend a £22,000 horse, but then had to unchain Django and sell him as she lived in a block of flats!
From The Guardian ● Jan. 28, 2013
They unchain you so you have the chance to do something entertaining.
From "Legend" by Marie Lu
“I started to realize that Afrofuturism is the vessel that I can tell this story because it really unchains the mind,” Hughley says.
From Washington Post ● Oct. 18, 2022
The Tahitian Guesthouse experience — like Airbnb, but with hosts who cook — unchains visitors from expensive hotels and offers a more authentic Polynesian experience.
From New York Times ● Jan. 8, 2019
So I’ve adopted another technique that I think works just as well but unchains me from the grill: using indirect heat.
From New York Times ● Sep. 11, 2015
"Why can't they cut jobs at the top rather than the bottom?" he mutters as he unchains the loungers.
From BBC ● Jun. 30, 2013
The guard unchains the gate and gestures for me to come inside.
From "Like Vanessa" by Tami Charles
He was the rubber-limbed, unchained id of “Seinfeld,” the most popular sitcom of its era and a cultural phenomenon cultish in its fervor but too massive to really be considered a cult.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 26, 2024
It's everything Logan wanted for ATN, and all we should have expected of an unchained slime puppy who should never caught us off guard.
From Salon ● May 20, 2023
The shape of the lights unchained in the chop of the dark water.
From New York Times ● Oct. 14, 2022
He concluded: "Luhrmann has made a woefully imperfect but at times arresting drama that builds to something moving and true. By the end, the film's melody has been unchained."
From BBC ● May 26, 2022
The guard slowly unchained him, removing his handcuffs and the shackles around his ankles, and then locked eyes with me and told me I had one hour.
From "Just Mercy" by Bryan Stevenson
Maybe the real trick to unchaining ourselves from the clutches of Big Tech is to free ourselves from our attachment to our digital things.
From Slate ● Dec. 26, 2023
We'll bear that in mind in the unlikely event of the Guardian's cellarmaster unchaining us.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 18, 2011
The amendments were in fact made upon petition by Mutual Broadcasting System, the fast-growing cooperative network which stands to lose nothing by an unchaining of small stations.
From Time Magazine Archive
I sneaked up to my spy position on the landing in time for Dad unchaining the door.
From "Black Swan Green" by David Mitchell
With his huge beak and tremendous black claws, no one dared think of unchaining him from his perch.
From "The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate" by Jacqueline Kelly
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.
