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far and away

far and away

14 3.7
By a lot more than others
  • idiom
translation icon : con diferencia
  • The penthouse is huge, far and away the best suite in the house.
  • far and away the most important
  • far and away the most

It will outperform this far and away in those metrics.

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Examples

  • But you are far and away the best one.

  • For my money, Microsoft's Ballpoint Mouse ($175, 800/4269400) is far and away the best of the bunch.

    Academic text (1993)
  • This one is by far and away the worst.

  • Well, that is far and away your best book.

  • This is I think far and away my favorite new web browser for the iPad.

  • Now, there are other causes of kidney failure, of course, but these are by far and away the most common causes.

  • So asset allocation is far and away the most important tool that we have available to us as investors.

  • It's by far and away the best policy of either campaign to have Medicare cover that.

  • He's far and away the most intelligent man I've ever met.

  • This one is by far and away the worst.

Synonyms

by far
vsfar and away
156 2.5

Shows that something is much better or more important than others

emphasizes amount or degree more than rank or importance
by a long way
vsfar and away
  • UK
1 3.0

By a much larger amount than others

stresses stronger general emphasis of being much better than others

Antonyms

1.0

Happens only by a very small amount

35 4.1

By a small amount

How Much

completely
1.0
far and away
14 3.7
considerably
144 3.4
somewhat
816 2.0

Surface Forms

far and away positive

Morphology

far + and + away

The primary sense 'by a very large amount' is signalled by 'far' (to a large degree), so a learner knowing the constituents can often infer an intensifying meaning; however the fixed phrase 'far and away' functions as an idiomatic superlative where 'and away' no longer contributes a literal spatial sense. Because the collocation is conventionalized and the exact pragmatic use (strong emphasis/comparative margin) is not fully predictable from the parts, it is partially transparent.

Etymology

The phrase far and away comes from a simple picture: something that is both far and away stands well apart from the rest. So, we use it to mean 'by a very large amount' or 'much more' than others.