close the loop
close the loop verb: to follow up; to tie up loose ends; to resolve.
Verb
close the loop (third-person singular simple present closes the loop, present participle closing the loop, simple past and past participle closed the loop)
- To follow up; to tie up loose ends; to resolve.
- Can you close the loop on this discussion by getting input from marketing and making a decision?
Forms of close the loop
| third-person singular present | closes the loop |
|---|---|
| present participle | closing the loop |
| past participle | closed the loop |
| past | closed the loop |
Origin of close the loop
Evidently by loose extension from control theory proper, regarding closed-loop control ("close the loop": "announce that enough feedback has been collected to successfully plan the system's next action"). Possibly influenced by the computer programming sense of "loop," in which program control will flow forever around an infinite loop until something is done to break (or exit) that loop.
Questions about close the loop
- What does close the loop mean?
- Close the loop means to follow up; to tie up loose ends; to resolve.
- What part of speech is close the loop?
- Close the loop is a verb.
- What is the past tense of close the loop?
- The past tense of close the loop is closed the loop.
Words near close the loop in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: close the loop (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.
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Cite this entry: “close the loop.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/close_the_loop. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.