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Glite Dictionary
to go for broke

to go for broke

7 6.4
To risk everything to try to succeed
  • idiom
  • Informal
translation icon : arriesgarlo todo
  • My solution was to go for broke, and it worked for me.
  • decided to go for broke
  • Let's go for broke
  • team decided to go for broke

Free of my own ego, free of my attachments, free to go for broke.

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Examples

  • We're going for broke.

    Airport (1970)

  • Should you take him on an open-ended tryout basis, or should you go for broke and make him legally yours?

    Academic text (1990)

  • I just wanna see everybody going for broke.

    Into the Wild (2007)

  • Guys, we gotta go for broke.

    The Little Rascals Save the Day (2014)

  • Do you wanna go for broke?

    Down with Love (2003)

  • Of course, sometimes you have to just go for broke and do it.

    Blog text (10)

  • But in that, I learned how to take risks and go for broke.

    St. Vincent (2014)

  • I'll take every resource that I have and I'll put it in and I'll go for broke if I believe in it.

    The Founder (2016)

  • Let's go for broke.

    Fiction book (1992)

  • If you want to succeed in this competition, you need to go for broke and give it your all.

Synonyms

to take a gamble
vsto go for broke
7 4.2

To do something risky hoping to get a good result

involves risking everything rather than taking a limited or partial risk
to swing for the fences
vsto go for broke
  • Informal
5 7.3

Try something risky to get a big reward

focuses on risking everything instead of taking one large but limited risk
to bet the ranch
vsto go for broke
  • Informal
1 8.2

To risk everything you have on one choice

applies when the all or nothing risk is part of a wider attempt to succeed

Antonyms

to play it safe
42 3.4

Choose a careful option to avoid risks

How Risky

to go for broke
  • Informal
7 6.4
to take risks
56 3.2

Surface Forms

go for broke infinitive
went for broke past
gone for broke past participle
going for broke present participle
goes for broke third person singular

Morphology

go + for + broke

The components 'go' (attempt/move) and 'broke' (penniless) give a partial clue — a learner might infer doing something that could leave you broke — but the idiomatic sense 'risk everything to try to succeed' is a metaphorical extension and not fully predictable from the parts. The expression originates in gambling and functions idiomatically, so a B1 learner who only knows the words would likely not derive the exact intended meaning without prior exposure.

Etymology

The idiom go for broke comes from gamblers who pushed all their chips to the middle and bet everything, ready to be broke which means 'have no money' if they lost. So it means 'to risk everything' to try to win or succeed.