Meanings
- USidiomaticOn unfriendly terms; estranged.
1977-1980, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure He's staying at my place because he & Bridg are on the outs.
4 more examples
I marvel that a mind on the outs with itself should have nevertheless made a painstaking record of its every tremor.
1961, Joan Didion, “On Self-Respect”, in Slouching Towards BethlehemA second ill of this day lies in the trend of getting more and more on the outs with those who have been more successful than we.
1964, John Anton Dahl, Student, School, and Society: Crosscurrents in Secondary Education, page 83"The first country, Nicaragua, was a give-away," noted one State Department observer, referring to the GSP review of the country most on the outs with the administration.
1998, Henry J. Frundt, Trade Conditions and Labor Rights: U.S. Initiatives, Dominican and Central ..., page 68The fact that he and her sister seemed to be more on the outs than ever may have been half her motivation in leaving the door open a crack.
2003, John Wingspread Howell, Naked in Church, page 409Synonyms: at odds
Synonyms & antonyms
prepositional phraseOn unfriendly terms; estranged.
Cite this entry
on the outs. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/on%20the%20outs
“on the outs.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/on%20the%20outs. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “on the outs,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/on%20the%20outs.
Source: on the outs on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.