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bottleneck

BOT-ul-nek /ˈbɒt.əl.nek/

nounB2GMATCAT

professionalinformal

A point of congestion in a system that occurs when workloads arrive too quickly for the production process to handle.

A bottleneck is the single slowest part of a process that determines the speed of the entire system.

The story behind the word. A literal description of the narrow part of a glass bottle. If you turn a bottle upside down, the liquid can only exit as fast as the neck allows. It began being used as a metaphor for traffic and industry in the early 20th century.

Word relationships

obstruction: An obstruction is a total block; a bottleneck is a narrowing that slows things down but doesn't necessarily stop them.

catalyst: A catalyst speeds up a process, whereas a bottleneck slows it down.

Commonly confused with

deadlock: A deadlock is a situation where no progress can be made at all; a bottleneck just limits the rate of progress.

Collocations

create a bottleneck
identify a bottleneck
eliminate a bottleneck
production bottleneck

Idioms & expressions

logjam

Example sentences

"The shortage of microchips has created a massive bottleneck in the automotive industry." Supply Chain
"The legal department's slow review process is the main bottleneck for our product launch." Project Management

Memory hook

Picture a wide highway suddenly narrowing into a single lane—that narrow part is the bottleneck. The narrowest point slows the whole flow.

When not to use

Don't use it for a general problem; it must be a specific point where things get stuck or slowed down.

Fun facts

In biology, a 'population bottleneck' occurs when a species' numbers are drastically reduced, limiting genetic diversity.