oh, well

A form of oh well — An expression of mild disappointment or resignation: too bad; it's a pity; what can you do; it is what it is.

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Meanings

interjection
  1. datedDated form of oh well.

    Hello? Hello? Is that zoo? … Well, nobody's talking baby talk. Well, I'm the man that called up about the leopard. You don't have to do anything about it. It's all been a mistake. Yes. Uh … Oh, well, stop them.

    1938 (film premiere), 1988 (book), Howard Hawks (director), [Hagar Wilde (screenwriter)], “Bringing Up Baby: The Continuity Script”, in Gerald Mast, editor, Bringing Up Baby (Rutgers Films in Print; 10), New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, published 1994, →ISBN, page 138
    3 more examples

    It was not until he heard a ring at the bell that he wondered how he should address her. Countess? That would seem like rubbing it in. Oh, well, it wasn't really necessary to call people anything, if one used a little management.

    1912 July, Henry Kitchell Webster, “The Ingredients”, in The Atlantic Monthly. A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics, volume CX, number 1, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor and Fields, […], →OCLC, page 21

    The meager X-ray facts are woefully inadequate and there is nothing upon modern roentgen-cardiography. And this book comes out of Boston where Holmes and George practice the art of roentgenology? Oh, well—Prophets without honor, etc.

    1924 November, “Physical Diagnosis by Richard C. Cabot, M.D., Professor of Medicine in Harvard University, Formerly Chief of the West Medical Service at the Massachusetts General Hospital. Eighth Edition, Revised and Enlarged with Six Plates and 279 Figures in the Text. New York, William Wood and Company, MDCCCCXXIII. Price, $5.00. [book review]”, in The Medical Herald and Physiotherapist: Incorporating The Medical Fortnightly & Laboratory News, St. Louis Clinique, General Practitioner and The Kansas City Medical Index-Lancet, volume XLIII, number 11, Kansas City, Mo.: Medical Herald Pub. Co., →OCLC, page 265, column 2

    (Sadly, the trip to the United Kingdom took all my frequent flyer miles. Because of that, I was unable to travel to Hawaii and investigate reports of kinky behavior among the ancient Hawaiian people involving cheap flowered shirts and macadamia nuts. Oh, well. Perhaps I’ll make it there before the second edition of this research is published.)

    2005, Annabelle du Fouet, “The murky world from whence it all came” (chapter 2), in Weather Balloons Make Rotten Sex Toys, Ellora's Cave, →ISBN, page 43
Cite this entry
APA

oh, well. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/oh%2C%20well

MLA

“oh, well.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/oh%2C%20well. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “oh, well,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/oh%2C%20well.

Source: oh, well on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.