Word.ws English Dictionary

for all the world

for all the world prepositional phrase: entirely, to all appearances.

Prepositional phrase

  1. (idiomatic) Entirely, to all appearances.
    • […] not a ha'porth of him left but a goodish piece of his skin, just for all the world like a hedgehog's, and a piece o' old iron furbished up.1861, Charles Reade, The Cloister and the Hearth
    • […] Phil offering and giving advice sagely and gravely, for all the world as though he had been old enough to be this young woman's father […]1885, Catherine Louisa Pirkis, Lady Lovelace

Questions about for all the world

What does for all the world mean?
For all the world means entirely, to all appearances.
What part of speech is for all the world?
For all the world is a prepositional phrase.

Words near for all the world in the dictionary

  1. for all of someone
  2. for all one is worth
  3. for all one knows
  4. for all practical purposes
  5. for all someone cares
  6. for all the world
  7. for all the world to see
  8. for all time
  9. for and on behalf of
  10. for another thing
  11. for any sake

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: for all the world (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-for all the world.ogg.

Cite this entry: “for all the world.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/for_all_the_world. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.