unclaimed
Britishadjective
Explanation
Unclaimed things haven't been collected or demanded, like an unclaimed sweatshirt in the lost-and-found bin at school. When you claim something, you make a formal request for it or assert that you have a right to it, the way you claim your seat at the theater or claim your bag from the baggage carousel at the airport. Bags that left at the airport or seats left empty? Those are unclaimed.
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.
Yet every year, millions of pounds worth of scholarships and bursary funding goes unclaimed by students - with many unaware the extra help exists.
From BBC ● Aug. 23, 2026
The reader who suggested leaving Social Security benefits unclaimed, if you don’t need them, does raise an interesting question about personal responsibility.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 3, 2026
The strike, unclaimed by any country or group, serves as a warning that the Suez Canal might not be a safe alternative for oil exports.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 30, 2026
Finally, Mahrang was arrested in March 2025, as she was leading a protest in Quetta after 13 unclaimed bodies - feared to be missing persons - were buried in the city.
From BBC ● Jun. 24, 2026
In fact no personal articles: what greeted him consisted of unclaimed debris which Polokov had inherited when he took the apartment and which in leaving he had abandoned to the next—if any—tenant.
From "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" by Philip K. Dick
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.
