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bypass

/ˈbaɪpæs//ˈbaɪpɑːs/·verb
to go around something, avoiding it rather than passing through it
Fig. 1 — A ball comes rolling down a channel straight at a wall that has every intention of stopping it.
01Definition

To bypass something is to route around it — to reach the far side without going through the obstacle in between. A new road bypasses the town; a clever argument bypasses the usual objection; surgery bypasses a blocked artery with a fresh channel. The key idea is avoidance by detour, not removal: the thing bypassed is left exactly where it was, untouched and intact, while you simply find another way past it. As a noun, a bypass is that alternative route.

02In use
  • iThe ring road lets through-traffic bypass the city centre entirely.
  • iiDrivers deviate onto a side lane to bypass the blocked junction instead of waiting.
  • iiiThe new procedure bypasses several steps that used to impede approval.
03Collocations
  • bypass the system
  • bypass the problem
  • a bypass road
  • bypass normal channels
  • bypass an obstacle

Family bypass (noun) · bypassed (adjective)

04Relations

=circumvent, skirt, sidestep, avoid, go around

≠confront, tackle, go through

06TOEFL & IELTS

Useful in IELTS for process and problem-solution essays: 'a measure that bypasses bureaucratic delay'. It often carries a faint sense of skipping the proper route, so 'bypass normal channels' can be mildly critical. In TOEFL it appears literally (roads, plumbing, anatomy) and figuratively (bypass a difficulty). Note it is one word and works as both verb and noun.

07Asked
What is a heart bypass?
In medicine, a bypass reroutes blood around a blocked coronary artery: surgeons graft a healthy vessel, taken from elsewhere in the body, so that blood reaches the heart muscle by the new channel. The formal name is coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). The blockage itself is not removed — which is the word's meaning working at full precision.
What is a bypass road?
A road built around a town or congested area so through-traffic never enters it — permanent infrastructure, often numbered as part of the main route. Its cousin the ring road circles the whole city. Towns campaign for bypasses for quiet, then sometimes mourn the passing trade the old route used to deliver.
What is the difference between a bypass and a detour?
Permanence. A bypass is engineered and stays: the map is redrawn around the obstacle. A detour is temporary — roadworks send you on it today and it is gone next month. Figuratively the same split holds: you detour around this week's crisis, but you bypass a procedure by building a lasting way around it.
What is the difference between bypass and circumvent?
Register and flavour. Bypass is the everyday, often physical verb; circumvent is its formal, strategic cousin and usually implies outwitting a rule or restriction — you bypass a slow junction, but a company circumvents regulations. Circumvent almost always raises an eyebrow; bypass only sometimes does.
Does 'bypass' sound critical?
Mildly, when the thing bypassed had authority: 'the minister bypassed parliament' implies dodging proper scrutiny, and in computing 'bypassing a filter' means getting around a control. The scene above keeps the tone honest — the ball loops over the wall and rolls on, and the wall stands there still, blocking a route nobody uses.
Is bypass one word or two?
One word, always — 'bypass', as verb ('the road bypasses the town') and noun ('a triple bypass'). Writing it as 'by pass' is an error, and the hyphenated 'by-pass' is an older British spelling now fading from style guides. The past tense is bypassed, with the double s intact.