How to Use inadequate in a Sentence

inadequate

adjective
  • I felt inadequate to the task.
  • These supplies are inadequate to meet our needs.
  • Her brother's success and popularity always made her feel inadequate.
  • We were given very inadequate information.
  • One of the hardest things to feel in life is inadequate.
    — Andy Greene, Rolling Stone, 8 Feb. 2023
  • But at the moment that is inadequate salve for what has been lost.
    — Bill Oram, oregonlive, 5 Aug. 2023
  • So, close your eyes and take a trip back through time to consider who and what might have led you to feel inadequate.
    — Svetlana Whitener, Forbes, 25 Aug. 2022
  • Sometimes, a claim is both false and based on an inadequate set of data.
    — Joedy McCreary, USA TODAY, 4 Mar. 2024
  • Even with a flapping of legs and the application of the end of the bridle reins, the horses’ pace seemed inadequate.
    — Frank C. Hibben, Outdoor Life, 13 Feb. 2025
  • Still, that move has been seen as inadequate by those who just want to be able to tinker with and fix their own machines.
    — WIRED, 22 Aug. 2022
  • But so many errors in a short time suggest that some of the backup systems might be inadequate to the task, Bellovin said.
    — Aaron Gregg, Drew Harwell, Anchorage Daily News, 23 Dec. 2021
  • Sometimes, a claim is both false and based on an inadequate set of data.
    — Joedy McCreary, USA TODAY, 2 Nov. 2024
  • If deemed inadequate, EU courts have the power to shut down data flows across the Atlantic.
    — Ece Yildirim, Quartz, 3 Apr. 2025
  • Checkout 19 comes labeled as a novel, but as with Pond, the term is inadequate to the book itself.
    — Gabriel Winslow-Yost, Harper’s Magazine , 16 Feb. 2022
  • The parents of all three victims said that the schools’ response was inadequate and that their children’s assailants were still at the same school.
    — Globe Staff, BostonGlobe.com, 18 May 2022
  • Young said inadequate staffing at the store is one of the chief complaints of union organizers.
    — CBS News, 19 July 2022
  • With the Afghan debacle in the background, the inadequate response to the threat to Ukraine will be a dress rehearsal for China and Taiwan.
    — WSJ, 25 Jan. 2022
  • Once added, there is inadequate due process for suspects to clear their names, critics say.
    — Morgan Cook, San Diego Union-Tribune, 20 Feb. 2022
  • Unrestricted cash has a lot of power to be able to fill in places where the safety net is inadequate.
    — Allison Parshall, Scientific American, 25 July 2024
  • That approach may be fine for commodity servers, but is inadequate for state-of-the-art AI.
    — Karl Freund, Forbes, 25 Jan. 2022
  • First, the law is often highly inadequate, and can at times threaten, in the EFF’s words, to also be a chainsaw when only a scalpel will do.
    — WIRED, 22 Sep. 2023
  • The world will continue to warm, the damage will increase, and the global response will be inadequate.
    — Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker, 20 Mar. 2023
  • And that leaves us with a series of wrenching questions: If setting a funds rate at 1 percent is inadequate, how high will be high enough?
    — Damon Linker, The Week, 15 Mar. 2022
  • The narrative of child care in the U.S. is one of scarcity — an inadequate supply of affordable care for the nation’s youngest children.
    — Jenny Gold, Los Angeles Times, 18 July 2023
  • The numbers on Covid have always been inadequate, in part because not every case is confirmed with a test.
    — Melody Schreiber, The New Republic, 22 Apr. 2022
  • The scissor jacks that come with most new cars, trucks, and SUVs are woefully inadequate.
    — Wes Siler, Outside Online, 24 Aug. 2022
  • The production plans--which aren’t done--have likely proven to be inadequate, forcing the shipyard to redo their work.
    — Craig Hooper, Forbes, 20 Feb. 2025
  • As Kevin’s direct supervisor, Big Greg makes Kevin feel inadequate as a provider and a man.
    — Joe Otterson, Variety, 19 July 2022
  • The viaduct, built in the 1960s, has had inadequate pedestrian infrastructure for decades.
    — Ariane Lange, Sacramento Bee, 13 Mar. 2025
  • But the decision stemmed from court filings that argued the evidence against Wood was woefully inadequate and that very little DNA evidence in the case was tested.
    — Amanda Lee Myers, USA TODAY, 12 Mar. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'inadequate.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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