Standstill

//ˈstændˌstɪl// noun

noun ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Complete immobility; a halt. countable, uncountable

    "The wreck brought traffic to a standstill for hours."

  2. 2
    an interruption of normal activity wordnet
  3. 3
    a situation in which no progress can be made or no advancement is possible wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
deadlockdeadlockhaltimpasseimpassestalemate

Example

More examples

"All the traffic was brought to a standstill by the accident."

Etymology

From stand + still, a deverbal from stand still. Compare Dutch stilstand (“standstill”), German Stillstand (“standstill”), Danish stilstand (“standstill”).

Related phrases

standstill agreement

More for "standstill"

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.