Word.ws English Dictionary

build a better mousetrap

build a better mousetrap verb: to create a new product, method, or idea that is better than an existing version of something already common or widely used.

Verb

build a better mousetrap (third-person singular simple present builds a better mousetrap, present participle building a better mousetrap, simple past and past participle built a better mousetrap)

  1. (idiomatic) To create a new product, method, or idea that is better than an existing version of something already common or widely used.
    • Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door. misattributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson
    • Of all the inventors to obtain patents, only a few have really built a better mousetrap.

Forms of build a better mousetrap

third-person singular presentbuilds a better mousetrap
present participlebuilding a better mousetrap
past participlebuilt a better mousetrap
pastbuilt a better mousetrap

Origin of build a better mousetrap

A shortening of build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door. Derived from the quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson: If a man has good corn or wood, or boards, or pigs, to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad hard-beaten road to his house, though it be in the woods. (1855).

Questions about build a better mousetrap

What does build a better mousetrap mean?
Build a better mousetrap means to create a new product, method, or idea that is better than an existing version of something already common or widely used.
What part of speech is build a better mousetrap?
Build a better mousetrap is a verb.
What is the past tense of build a better mousetrap?
The past tense of build a better mousetrap is built a better mousetrap.

Words near build a better mousetrap in the dictionary

  1. Buicks
  2. buie
  3. Buikema
  4. Buikemas
  5. build
  6. build a better mousetrap
  7. build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door
  8. build a bridge and get over it
  9. build a case
  10. build a fire under
  11. build air castles

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: build a better mousetrap (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-build a better mousetrap.ogg.

Cite this entry: “build a better mousetrap.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/build_a_better_mousetrap. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.