English Idioms for Everyday Conversation: What They Mean and How to Use Them

What an idiom is, and how to use this list

Cambridge defines an idiom as “a group of words in a fixed order that has a particular meaning that is different from the meanings of each word on its own.” Two parts of that definition matter when you speak. A fixed order means you can’t rearrange or swap the words: it’s “an arm and a leg,” not “a leg and an arm,” and “a piece of cake,” not “a slice of cake.” A different meaning means you can’t work it out word by word: someone who is “under the weather” isn’t talking about the weather.

Every idiom below has a register. Casual idioms are fine with friends and most coworkers but too relaxed for a formal email or a first meeting with a client. Neutral ones work almost anywhere, meetings included. Every idiom that Cambridge or Wiktionary marks informal, colloquial or slang is listed as casual. The examples use American English; where British English says it differently, the section on regional idioms has both.

You don’t need all 38. Recognize as many as you can, and pick a handful you’d actually say. One idiom that fits sounds natural; a string of them sounds memorized. Our guide to advanced English conversation calls idioms seasoning, and seasoning works in small amounts.

Idioms for agreeing and reacting

These are short replies to what someone just said, so they’re the easiest idioms to start using. For full phrases to give your opinion or disagree politely, see how to agree and disagree in English.

• Tell me about it is a reaction, not a request. After a complaint, it means “I know exactly what you mean.” To ask for details, say “What happened?”
• That makes two of us is for shared problems and bad feelings: Cambridge says you use it when you’re “in the same unpleasant situation” or have “the same negative feelings.” For good news, “Me too!” is simpler.
• Fair enough accepts a point. Followed by “but,” it accepts one point and pushes back on the rest, a use Wiktionary lists too: “Fair enough, but we still need it by Friday.”

Idioms for work and meetings

Office English has its own set of idioms. All of these are fine in a meeting or a chat message to a colleague; keep the casual ones out of formal emails.

• Touch base is a quick check-in, not a long meeting: Cambridge defines it as “to talk to someone for a short time.” It usually takes “with”: touch base with Ana.
• On the same page means you agree or understand the same thing. Don’t mix it up with “in the same boat,” which means you share the same problem (more in the mistakes section).
• A ballpark figure comes from baseball: a ballpark is a baseball stadium. Give one when you can’t be exact yet, and say so: “Ballpark, about two weeks.”

Idioms about time

These come up when you talk about deadlines, schedules and how often things happen.

• Add “just” to in the nick of time for emphasis: “just in the nick of time.”
• Call it a day usually means stopping for today. It can also mean stopping for good: Wiktionary lists “to retire” as a second sense. Context tells you which.

Idioms about money

Prices, budgets and saving come up in everyday small talk, and these idioms let you talk about them without numbers.

• Use break the bank in the negative: “It won’t break the bank” means it’s affordable. Both Cambridge and Dictionary.com give negative examples, and Cambridge marks the idiom humorous.
• Make ends meet is about covering basic costs like rent and food: Cambridge defines it as having “just enough money to pay for the things that you need.”

Idioms about feelings and health

Use these to say how you are, beyond “fine” and “tired.”

• Under the weather is for a cold or feeling run-down, not a serious illness: Cambridge’s American dictionary defines it as “not completely well.” It has nothing to do with the weather outside.
• Get cold feet is about a plan you’ve already made, often a big one; the example in Cambridge is getting married. It doesn’t mean your feet are cold.
• Butterflies can be good nerves or bad ones: Wiktionary links the feeling to nervousness, anxiety or excitement.

Idioms about difficulty and ease

These help you say how hard something was, or warn someone before they start.

• A piece of cake needs the article: “It was a piece of cake,” not “It was piece of cake.”
• Bite off more than you can chew often works as a warning: “Don’t bite off more than you can chew.” Wiktionary’s usage note says the same.
• The last straw keeps “the.” Cambridge also lists “the final straw.”

Idioms for small talk

These help you start a conversation, react to a coincidence and leave politely.

• Long time no see sounds like broken grammar because it started that way: Dictionary.com calls it a jocular imitation of broken English from the late 1800s. Say it to people you know, and reply with “I know, it’s been ages.” Our guide to English greetings has more ways to say hello.
• Speak of the devil is a friendly joke, and Wiktionary marks it humorous. It isn’t an insult, so say it with a smile.
• Hit the sack and hit the hay mean the same thing. Wiktionary marks both slang, so keep them for friends and family.

Practice Sam’s lines with the trainer, then switch roles. We packed six idioms into nine lines so you can hear them in context: long time no see, tell me about it, up in the air, cutting it close, keep me in the loop and speak of the devil. In your own conversations, one or two that fit is plenty. The names and dates are made up for illustration.

Idioms that sound dated or regional

Dictionaries label some idioms old-fashioned, and others differ between American and British English. It helps to recognize them, but check the label before you say one.

Old-fashioned idioms

What about rain cats and dogs? Neither Cambridge nor Wiktionary labels it old-fashioned, so it isn’t wrong. In everyday speech, “It’s pouring” says the same thing in two words; Cambridge’s American dictionary explains that if you say it is pouring, “you mean that it is raining heavily.”

American and British versions

This guide uses American English. If you work with British colleagues or watch British TV, you’ll hear the other version of these:

Two idioms from the work list lean American: Wiktionary marks touch base North American and ballpark figure chiefly US. One reaction leans the other way: Cambridge marks fair enough British and informal, though the American Heritage idioms dictionary on Dictionary.com lists it too. And when British speakers finally understand something, they may say “the penny dropped”; Wiktionary marks the penny drops UK and informal.

How to learn idioms so you can use them when you speak

Reading a list helps you understand idioms. Saying them is a different skill: the idiom has to come out whole, in the right situation, while you’re thinking about what you want to say. This routine is our suggestion; adjust it to the time you have.

1. Pick five. Choose idioms you could use this week, at work or with friends. “Up in the air” is useful if you talk about plans; “speak of the devil” is useful if you share an office.
2. Learn each one as a chunk, inside a sentence about your life. Not “touch base = contact,” but “I’ll touch base with my manager on Monday.” Keep the small words that belong to it: a piece of cake, touch base with, the last straw.
3. Learn the situation with the words. Who says it, to whom and in what mood? “Long time no see” is for a friend you haven’t seen in a while, not for a client you’re meeting for the first time.
4. Say it out loud. Say your sentence three times, then use it to answer a question: “How’s the project going?” “It’s still up in the air.”
5. Review on a spaced schedule. Go back to your five the next day, then a few days later, then a week later. A flashcard app with spaced repetition can keep the schedule for you.
6. Use one in a real conversation, then add the next. Once an idiom comes out without effort, replace it on your list with a new one.

How far apart should the reviews be? A review of 317 experiments on spaced practice by Nicholas Cepeda and colleagues found that the gap between study sessions that gave the best retention grew longer the longer people had to remember the material (Psychological Bulletin, 2006). Those experiments tested verbal recall, not speaking, and the growing gaps in step 5 are our suggestion, so treat the schedule as a starting point.

Is it worth learning phrases at all? One small study suggests it can be. Frank Boers and colleagues worked with 32 college students majoring in English over 22 teaching hours of authentic listening and reading. The 17 students who were taught to notice fixed word combinations, idiomatic expressions included, were judged more proficient in an interview by two judges who didn’t know which group they were in (Language Teaching Research, 2006). The authors conclude that helping learners build a store of such phrases can help their speaking. For more on learning phrases instead of single words, see how to think in English.

Common mistakes with English idioms

• Translating an idiom from your own language. An idiom you know may not exist in English, or it may exist with different words. Spanish costar un ojo de la cara is “cost an arm and a leg,” not “cost an eye of the face.” The next section has more for your language.
• Changing a word. Idioms are fixed. It’s “an arm and a leg,” not “an arm and a foot”; “a piece of cake,” not “a piece of a cake”; “in the nick of time,” not “in the nick of the time.”
• Mixing two idioms. Wiktionary calls this a mixed metaphor: two idioms combined so that they clash. “We’re on the same boat” blends “on the same page” (we agree) with “in the same boat” (we have the same problem, per Wiktionary). Pick the one you mean. Some mixes are jokes on purpose: Wiktionary describes “rocket surgery” as a deliberate blend of rocket science and brain surgery.
• Using too many. Three idioms in a row sound memorized, and some work idioms come with baggage: Wiktionary’s usage note on circle back (come back to a topic later) says it is often considered clichéd or even passive-aggressive. Use an idiom when it says something better than plain English, and plain English the rest of the time.
• Missing the register. “Let’s call it a day” is fine in a team meeting; in a formal email to a client, “Let’s continue tomorrow” is safer. Telling your manager you’re under the weather is fine, but in a formal note, write “unwell.”

Idioms that don’t translate: notes for Japanese, Korean, Spanish and Portuguese speakers

Your first language has its own idioms, and the easiest mistake is to translate them word for word. Some have an English match with different images, some look like an English idiom but mean something else, and a few match almost exactly. The meanings below come from Wiktionary unless another dictionary is named.

If you speak Spanish

Cambridge’s Spanish–English dictionary translates en las nubes as “with one’s head in the clouds”: someone who doesn’t notice what’s happening around them. “On cloud nine” means extremely happy, so “I was on cloud nine in the meeting” says you loved it, not that you weren’t listening. The same dictionary gives meter la pata as “to put one’s foot in it,” the British form. And la gota que colmó el vaso is “the last straw”; Wiktionary gives the longer “the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

If you speak Portuguese

Priberam defines chover no molhado as insisting on doing or saying something redundant and useless. Wiktionary gives “carry coals to Newcastle,” but that is a British idiom for bringing something to a place that already has plenty (Cambridge). Priberam’s own example, correndo o risco de chover no molhado, matches “at the risk of stating the obvious,” and Cambridge defines state the obvious as saying “something that everyone can easily see or understand already.” In a meeting, “We’ve already covered that” works for a point you’ve discussed before. Cambridge’s Portuguese–English dictionary lists both senses of nas nuvens, in ecstasy or distracted, so decide which one you mean before you translate. Priberam defines pagar o pato as suffering the consequences of what someone else did, which is Wiktionary’s sense of take the fall. Wiktionary marks pisar na bola as Brazilian slang for “drop the ball”: the ball stays, but you drop it instead of stepping on it.

If you speak Japanese or Korean

耳が痛い and “my ears are burning” both use ears, but Wiktionary defines 耳が痛い as “hit too close to home” and ears are burning as being the topic of discussion somewhere else. In the same way, 鼻が高い means proud (Wiktionary), while having your nose in the air means being disdainful or stuck up, so say “I’m so proud of her.” For 顔が広い and 발이 넓다, Wiktionary gives “well connected” and “know a lot of people.” Cambridge defines well connected as knowing important or powerful people, so “know a lot of people” is the safer everyday choice.

Idioms that do match

Some idioms have a direct English equivalent, sometimes even with the same image. Spanish dar en el clavo is “hit the nail on the head,” and romper el hielo, like Portuguese quebrar o gelo, is “break the ice.” “Speak of the devil” has a match in all four languages: hablando del rey de Roma, falando do diabo, 噂をすれば影がさす and 호랑이도 제 말 하면 온다. So does “kill two birds with one stone”: matar dos pájaros de un tiro, matar dois coelhos com uma cajadada só (with rabbits), 一石二鳥 and 일석이조. Wiktionary lists all of these as equivalents.

Practice idioms in conversation with an AI tutor

The last step of the routine, using an idiom in a real conversation, is the hardest to arrange. In Fluently, you talk with an AI tutor by voice, like on a phone call. You can describe your own scenario for a role-play, and the tutor plays the other role. For example: “You’re my coworker. It’s Monday morning, and we’re catching up before a meeting. Talk to me naturally, the way coworkers do.” Pick two or three idioms from this page before the call and try to use each one once.

After your turn, a card can show a grammar fix, a more natural way to say your sentence (the way a native speaker would put it) or a better word, and the conversation keeps going. Your scores for pronunciation, fluency, vocabulary, grammar and coherence update as you practice. In the settings, you can turn off live captions, so you practice catching phrases by ear, and change the tutor’s speaking pace: start slower, then move to normal speed.

To see where you stand first, the free English speaking test in the app is a conversation of about four minutes that estimates your CEFR level and gives you an overall score out of 100 and scores for five skills.

Fluently is free to start. Take a free AI speaking assessment to see your level, then practice with games that build your vocabulary and pronunciation. Conversations with your AI tutor come with Fluently Premium.

Take your five idioms into a real conversation

Get the Fluently app and take the free AI speaking assessment to see your level, then practice with games that build your vocabulary and pronunciation. Conversations with your AI tutor, where you can role-play your own scenarios and get cards after your turn, come with Fluently Premium.

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