too hot to hold
- idiom
- Informal
:
demasiado popular para manejar
- Those limited edition sneakers were too hot to hold and disappeared from stores almost instantly.
Examples
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The band's latest album is too hot to hold, selling out within hours of release.
-
This concert ticket is too hot to hold since it's sold out.
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Her new book became too hot to hold, topping bestseller lists around the world.
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The new smartphone is too hot to hold right now!
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Her new book became too hot to hold, topping bestseller lists around the world.
-
The band's latest album is too hot to hold, selling out within hours of release.
-
Those limited edition sneakers were too hot to hold and disappeared from stores almost instantly.
Synonyms
412
3.4
Very popular and wanted by many people
36
2.9
Wanted by many people
1
8.0
Very popular with a certain group of people
Having more people who want something than there are places or tickets
Antonyms
How Popular
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase's parts (too = excessive; hot = literally high temperature or figuratively popular; hold = keep/manage) give clear clues so a learner can infer an idea of excess, but mapping the literal ‘too hot to hold’ to the idiomatic sense of high demand or difficult to manage requires a metaphorical extension. Because the overall meaning depends on this figurative shift rather than being fully predictable from the constituents, it is only partially transparent to B1 learners.
Etymology
Too hot to hold paints the picture of something so hot you cannot hold it in your hands without burning yourself. So, when something is called 'in demand' today, too hot to hold means it is so popular that it is hard to keep or control.