intolerable

comparative more intolerable · superlative most intolerable · alternative obsolete untolerable

1. Not tolerable; not capable of being borne or endured.First known use the 15th c.

   Fernando Clavijo, head of the Canary Islands government, posted on X: "It is intolerable that lives continue to be lost. The Canaries cannot get used to or accept as normal the fact that the Atlantic continues to be a death trap."

   2026 September 3, James Gregory, “More than 80 migrants feared dead after boat rescued off Canary Islands”, in BBC News, retrieved 03 Sep 2026

   Synonyms: insufferable, insupportable, unbearable, unsittable

2. Extremely offensive or insulting.

   It is an intolerable sound that sets spoons tinkling in saucers and windowpanes vibrating.

   1971, William S. Burroughs, The Wild Boys: A Book of the Dead, page 4

   1 more example

   “I call on all citizens of Berlin and across Germany to wear the yarmulke (as the skullcap is known in Yiddish) next Saturday if there are new, intolerable attacks targeting Israel and Jews on the occasion of Al-Quds Day in Berlin,” said Felix Klein in a statement.

   2019 May 28, Jack Guy and Antonia Mortensen, “Germans urged to wear Jewish skullcap ahead of anti-Israel protests”, in CNN

3. nuclear powerExtremely worn and degraded, to the point of being unsafe.

   o take apart an ageing nuclear facility, you have to put a lot of other things together first. New technologies, for instance, and new buildings to replace the intolerable ones, and new reserves of money.

   2022 December 15, Samanth Subramanian, “Dismantling Sellafield: the epic task of shutting down a nuclear site”, in The Guardian