to go downhill
37
3.9
- phrasal verb
- Informal
:
empeorar
- This place has really gone downhill.
- go downhill from there
And yeah, life just started going downhill quick from there.
- And yeah, life just started going downhill quick from there.
- And then it starts going downhill fast.
- Right after that it goes downhill so quick.
- You know, your content would just, it's just going to go downhill if you're not posting.
- And things go downhill very quickly from there.
- But Long story short, you know, like that starts to go downhill pretty fast.
- But now that I had my baby, things went downhill.
- And then it just, it just just went downhill, unfortunately.
- Because if He cannot lead you, we start to now go downhill from there.
- Things turned out fairly good and then they start to go downhill.
- And yeah, then it sort of went downhill a little bit.
- The quality of all of those things goes downhill.
Examples
-
My life has been going downhill for about 15 years.
-
After several poor decisions, the team's performance started to go downhill rapidly.
-
And yeah, life just started going downhill quick from there.
-
And then it starts going downhill fast.
-
And things go downhill very quickly from there.
-
But Long story short, you know, like that starts to go downhill pretty fast.
-
You know, I mean, she just went downhill very quickly.
-
After that, things started to go downhill.
-
"Things have been going downhill the past few years, sir.
Fiction book (2002) -
And things sort of just went downhill from there.
Fiction book (1999)
Synonyms
344
3.7
To become less over time, for example in value or health
146
5.9
To get worse in quality, condition, or value
105
3.2
Become weaker or less able over time
50
4.5
The gradual loss of strength or good condition over time
49
5.1
To make something worse in quality or value
49
2.6
Become less in number, amount, or quality
34
6.3
To become worse and lose order or control
20
7.4
To become worse and more chaotic
19
4.3
To become less in amount or quality
17
4.1
To become bad or fail, for example a relationship
9
5.9
To lose value over time, especially money or assets
9
9.9
To go very badly and fail completely
9
4.8
A clear drop in how well something works or how much there is
2
3.3
To become less over time
To become worse slowly in a calm, controlled way without sudden failure
Antonyms
How Bad
350
4.1
- Informal
37
3.9
61
3.9
184
3.5
17
2.9
Surface Forms
Morphology
The sense 'to gradually become worse' is a metaphorical extension of the literal image of moving downhill, so a learner who knows 'go' and 'downhill' can often infer a decline in quality. This spatial→evaluative mapping is common cross-linguistically but is a figurative shift rather than a strictly compositional meaning, so it is only partially predictable.
Etymology
Go downhill comes from the simple picture of go + downhill: when something moves down a hill it often loses height and speed and can slip out of control. That's why people say something 'goes downhill' when it slowly starts to get worse.