in the meantime

alternative in the mean time

1. Meanwhile.

   "In the meantime," said Norbourne, "we have arrived at the park-gate, and have not determined whither we shall ride."

   1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “Different Views of Youth and Age”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 101

   2 more examples

   But in the meantime Robin Hood and his band lived quietly in Sherwood Forest, without showing their faces abroad, for Robin knew that it would not be wise for him to be seen in the neighborhood of Nottingham, those in authority being very wroth with him.

   1883, Howard Pyle, chapter V, in The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood […], New York, N.Y.: […] Charles Scribner’s Sons […], →OCLC

   In the meantime, the long-awaited battle of Hsuchow had started (inauspiciously with the Japanese taking the small walled town to the northeast, T'ai-erh-chuang).

   1979, Guy S. Alitto, The Last Confucian: Liang Shu-ming and the Chinese Dilemma of Modernity, University of California Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 293

   Synonyms: for the meantime, in meantime, this meantime