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the rest is history

the rest is history

2 4.4
People say this when what happens next is well known
  • idiom
  • Informal
translation icon : y el resto es historia
  • And the rest is history.

I started earning money and the rest is history.

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Examples

  • "It was Anna, and as they say, the rest is history."

    Fiction book (1991)
  • At the age of 3, Ryan received an NES from a relative, and the rest is history.

    Blog text (31)
  • And the rest is history.

  • Giving up points in the first quarter for the first time all year woke the team up, and the rest was history.

    Blog text (31)
  • Ross and Rachel ended up being far more interesting to write, and the rest is history.

    Blog text (31)
  • And the rest is history, albeit a rocky one.

    Academic text (2009)
  • Then Manafort set up a meeting with Mike Pence and the rest is history, just like the Republican Party.

  • After modest success as an Elvis-style rocker, the singer now named Conway Twitty began performing country music in 1968, and the rest is history.

    Academic text (2018)
  • And so, as you know, the rest is history, dear.

  • We fixed it, and then the rest is history.

Synonyms

there you have it
vsthe rest is history
35 6.1

That shows the work is finished or the result is ready

indicates that what comes next is well known, notable, or unsurprising

How Well-Known

the rest is history
  • Informal
2 4.4
famous
1.0
known
2 1.0
obscure
84 7.0

Surface Forms

Morphology

the + rest + be + history

The literal parts ('rest' = remainder; 'history' = past events) give a loose clue that the remaining events became part of the past/known, so a learner might infer something about what followed. However, the phrase functions as a conventional discourse marker meaning 'and then the well-known outcome followed' and this pragmatic, conventionalized use is not fully predictable from the words alone.

Etymology

The phrase the rest is history comes from storytellers who would stop after the key event because what happened next was already well known, as if the rest was already 'history'. So we now say it to mean 'what happened next is well known'.