Meaning & use
breached contract
Last updated
Meaning
nouncountable
A contract that one side has broken by failing to do what it promised.
Grammar: Countable; you can say 'a breached contract' or 'the breached contract'. It is less common than the phrase 'breach of contract'.
Patterns
- a breached contract
- the breached contract
- sue over a breached contract
The supplier delivered nothing, so we are now dealing with a breached contract.
She took the company to court over a breached contract.
A breached contract can still be enforced if the other side agrees to fix the problem.
Word forms
| plural | breached contracts |
|---|
Common combinations
- breach of contract
- The builder was accused of breach of contract after walking off the job.
- in breach of contract
- By hiring another firm, they were in breach of contract.
- sue for breach of contract
- The artist decided to sue for breach of contract.
- a breach of contract claim
- She filed a breach of contract claim in the local court.
Synonyms and how they differ
- broken agreement
- A general term for any deal that has not been kept; 'breached contract' is the legal term used in court.
- violated contract
- Similar, but 'violated' is stronger and often suggests a serious or deliberate act.
Opposites
Word family
Commonly confused: breached contract or breach of contract?
breached contract vs breach of contract
This is the usual legal phrase for the wrong act itself, while 'breached contract' describes the agreement that has been broken.
Practice
The court found that the company had signed a ______ contract by missing the deadline.
Choose one answer.
We need an adjective-like past participle to describe the contract, so 'breached' is correct. 'Breach' is a noun or base verb and cannot directly modify 'contract' here.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “breached contract”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.