to nothing beats
10
4.0
- idiom
- Informal
:
nada como
- Now I love to travel with my grandchildren; nothing beats doing so.
- nothing beats the taste
- nothing beats Mom
- nothing beats a good
Examples
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Nothing beats watching a child find something that sparks an interest or ignites some major fascination.
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Various models have come and gone, but nothing beats the reliability and great mileage that you can expect from this hardy, fuel-efficient creation.
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Sure, you can imagine it, but nothing beats being there.
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Nothing beats the real thing, huh?
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Photographic Coach can help you gain these skills over time, but nothing beats real work experience.
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Or, if you play games, nothing beats a keyboard and a good mouse.
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After months of slow fishing, nothing beats catching sometimes hundreds of bass in a day.
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But nothing beats having a coffee or tea and talking face-to-face.
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Nothing beats a livermush, egg, and cheese sandwich for breakfast!
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If you want to send a message, nothing beats hand delivery.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase 'nothing beats [X]' is directly interpretable as 'no thing defeats or surpasses X' by combining 'nothing' (no thing) with 'beat' (to defeat/ be better than). This metaphorical extension of 'beat' to mean 'be superior' is common and follows straightforward compositional logic, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents will very likely understand the meaning.
Etymology
The phrase nothing beats comes from a simple contest idea: to 'beat' something is to win against it. So if nothing beats a thing, nothing can win against it or be 'better' than it.