Word.ws English Dictionary

a long time coming

a long time coming adjective: in-process, delayed, awaited, or deserved for a considerable duration of time; overdue.

Adjective

a long time coming (not comparable)

  1. (set phrase) In-process, delayed, awaited, or deserved for a considerable duration of time; overdue.
    • "The water is a long time coming. Try another glass of wine."1870, Wilkie Collins, chapter 10, in Man and Wife
    • "Your letter was a long time coming. I had waited a week—ten days."1912, Edith Wharton, chapter 11, in The Reef, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton and Company

Examples of a long time coming in a sentence

  • The breakthrough in the Paris talks was a long time coming.1968 November 15, “World: The Moment of Truth”, in Time, retrieved 21 Apr 2015:
  • It has been a long time coming—39 years to be exact—but women's tennis players will receive prize money equal to the men's at Wimbledon this year.2007 February 22, Christopher Clarey, “Tennis: Next time, she will get equal pay”, in New York Times, retrieved 21 Apr 2015:
  • "It's been such a long time coming but finally justice has been done, and an innocent man can be allowed to get on with the rest of his life."2009 September 9, Chris Johnson, “Liverpool fan Michael Shields free with royal pardon”, in Click Liverpool, UK, retrieved 21 Apr 2015:

Forms of a long time coming

alternative forma long time in coming

Questions about a long time coming

What does a long time coming mean?
A long time coming means in-process, delayed, awaited, or deserved for a considerable duration of time; overdue.
How do you use a long time coming in a sentence?
The breakthrough in the Paris talks was a long time coming.
What part of speech is a long time coming?
A long time coming is an adjective.

Words near a long time coming in the dictionary

  1. a little learning is a dangerous thing
  2. a little matter
  3. a little of something goes a long way
  4. a little of the creature
  5. a little pot is soon hot
  6. a long time coming
  7. a long time in coming
  8. a lot
  9. a lot a bit
  10. a lot of bit
  11. a lottle

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: a long time coming (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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