Word.ws English Dictionary

backtracking

/ˈbæk.tɹækɪŋ/

backtracking noun: the act of one who, or that which, backtracks; a retracing of one's steps. Also the present participle and gerund of backtrack.

Noun

backtracking (countable and uncountable, plural backtrackings)

  1. The act of one who, or that which, backtracks; a retracing of one's steps.
  2. The usage of a runway as a taxiway, especially at private strips and smaller airports.
  3. The act of building all possible solutions to a problem incrementally, abandoning any candidate solution if it cannot lead to a valid solution.
    • backtracking algorithm
    • Backtracking is used to solve problems in which a sequence of objects is chosen from a specific set so that the sequence satisfies some criterion. The classic example of the use of backtracking is the n-Queens problem.2004, Richard E. Neapolitan, Kumarss Naimipour, Foundations of Algorithms Using C++ Pseudocode, 3rd edition, Jones & Bartlett Learning, →ISBN, page 188

Also used as

backtracking is also the present participle and gerund of backtrack.

Forms of backtracking

pluralbacktrackings

Words formed from backtracking

Questions about backtracking

What does backtracking mean?
Backtracking means the act of one who, or that which, backtracks; a retracing of one's steps.
What part of speech is backtracking?
Backtracking is a noun.
How do you pronounce backtracking?
Backtracking is pronounced /ˈbæk.tɹækɪŋ/ (US).
What is the plural of backtracking?
The plural of backtracking is backtrackings.

Words near backtracking in the dictionary

  1. backtrack
  2. backtrackable
  3. backtracked
  4. backtracker
  5. backtrackers
  6. backtracking
  7. backtrackings
  8. backtracks
  9. backtrail
  10. backtrailed
  11. backtrailing

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: backtracking (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-backtracking.wav.

Cite this entry: “backtracking.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/backtracking. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.