In the loop Informal

Part of a select group that is kept informed about plans, decisions, or developments.

It’s often used as a request or promise — “keep me in the loop” — signaling that ongoing updates, not just a final result, are expected or wanted.

The phrase’s precise origin is genuinely disputed among language historians, with no single confirmed source. One theory traces it to aviation and electronic control systems, where a “loop” describes a closed feedback circuit that continuously receives and responds to information. A competing theory points to military command-and-control language, where a “feedback loop” described orders passed down to personnel and reports passed back up, keeping commanders continuously updated. Both theories agree the phrase, along with its opposite “out of the loop,” came into wide use in the 1960s and 1970s and later developed into the common, more general workplace and social sense of being included or excluded from an information flow.

Please keep me in the loop on this project.

She’s always in the loop about office news.

I wasn’t in the loop about the schedule change.

A: “Did you hear about the merger?” B: “Yes, I’ve been in the loop.”