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no choice

no choice

445 1.4
A situation in which you must do something because nothing else is possible
  • noun
  • /noʊ tʃɔɪs/
translation icon : ninguna opción
  • The ships had no choice but to leave in search of ports that would accept their passengers.
  • no choice but to accept
  • left with no choice
  • no choice but to move

It's much worse to have no choice than too much, much worse.

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Examples

  • The regular teacher has no choice but to accept all pupils in a district or area.

    Academic text (2000)
  • The storm left us with no choice but to cancel our plans for the weekend.

  • And she has no choice in this.

  • And I was just like, well, I have no choice now but to love this boy.

  • You have no choice but to trust me.

  • Unfortunately, you leave me no choice.

  • You left me no choice.

  • And because this request is done in the correct way, we have no choice but to help.

    Academic text (1996)
  • Most legal experts say the industry has no choice but to fight and win every case.

    Academic text (1994)
  • Accordingly, we have no choice but to move quickly to seek a cure.

    Academic text (1998)

Synonyms

Hobson's choice
vsno choice
  • Informal
1 8.4

A situation where you must take the only option or have nothing

says there are simply no alternatives rather than a single offered option

Antonyms

1.0

One thing you pick or the act of picking from several things

2.2

A choice between two or more things

How Free

free
1.0
permissible
37 4.1
obliged
1 4.4
no choice
445 1.4
forced
3.4

Surface Forms

no choice singular
no choices plural

Morphology

no + choice

The phrase combines 'no' (not any) with 'choice' (option), so its meaning 'there are no options/alternatives' is directly and predictably derived from the constituents. This compositional pattern (equivalent to 'no option') is cross-linguistically common and would be immediately understandable to a B1 learner who knows both words.

Etymology

No choice paints a simple picture: imagine you stand at a crossroads but one path is blocked, so there is literally no other choice left. So it means 'there are no other options' and you must do something because nothing else is possible.