Word.ws English Dictionary

cut someone some slack

cut someone some slack verb: to make allowances for someone, and not treat a failure severely.

Verb

cut someone some slack (third-person singular simple present cuts someone some slack, present participle cutting someone some slack, simple past and past participle cut someone some slack)

  1. (idiomatic) To make allowances for someone, and not treat a failure severely.
    • He's the new kid on the block and doesn't know the way we do things around here yet. Cut him some slack and let him learn from this.

Synonyms of cut someone some slack

Forms of cut someone some slack

third-person singular presentcuts someone some slack
present participlecutting someone some slack
past participlecut someone some slack
pastcut someone some slack

Questions about cut someone some slack

What does cut someone some slack mean?
Cut someone some slack means to make allowances for someone, and not treat a failure severely.
What part of speech is cut someone some slack?
Cut someone some slack is a verb.
What is the past tense of cut someone some slack?
The past tense of cut someone some slack is cut someone some slack.

Words near cut someone some slack in the dictionary

  1. cut someone cold
  2. cut someone dead
  3. cut someone loose
  4. cut someone off at the knees
  5. cut someone slack
  6. cut someone some slack
  7. cut someone's comb
  8. cut someone's throat
  9. cut splice
  10. cut splices
  11. cut stick

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cut someone some slack (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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