Word.ws English Dictionary

leave well enough alone

/ˈliːv ˈwɛl ɪˌnʌf əˈləʊn/

leave well enough alone verb: to leave something alone; to avoid trying to correct, fix, or improve what is already adequate.

Verb

leave well enough alone (third-person singular simple present leaves well enough alone, present participle leaving well enough alone, simple past and past participle left well enough alone)

  1. To leave something alone; to avoid trying to correct, fix, or improve what is already adequate.
    • We should have left well enough alone when we had it working the first time.

Synonyms of leave well enough alone

Forms of leave well enough alone

third-person singular presentleaves well enough alone
present participleleaving well enough alone
past participleleft well enough alone
pastleft well enough alone

Questions about leave well enough alone

What does leave well enough alone mean?
Leave well enough alone means to leave something alone; to avoid trying to correct, fix, or improve what is already adequate.
What part of speech is leave well enough alone?
Leave well enough alone is a verb.
How do you pronounce leave well enough alone?
Leave well enough alone is pronounced /ˈliːv ˈwɛl ɪˌnʌf əˈləʊn/.
What is the past tense of leave well enough alone?
The past tense of leave well enough alone is left well enough alone.

Words near leave well enough alone in the dictionary

  1. leave things alone
  2. leave things be
  3. leave to chance
  4. leave to the imagination
  5. leave well alone
  6. leave well enough alone
  7. leave with the one that brought ya
  8. leave with the one that brung ya
  9. leave with the one that brung you
  10. leave with the one what brought ya
  11. leave with the one what brought you

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: leave well enough alone (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-leave well enough alone.wav.

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