Word.ws English Dictionary

not to worry

not to worry phrase: there is no need for concern; there isn't a serious problem.

Phrase

not to worry

  1. There is no need for concern; there isn't a serious problem.
    • She didn't catch this train, but not to worry: she can get the next one.
    • For those whose economic outlook may be summarised in that hackneyed expression "Not to worry," then the latest figures could be interpreted as conducive to that conviction.1958, The Shipbuilder and Marine Engine-builder, volume 65, Shipbuilder Press, page 371
    Synonyms:
    no worries

Synonyms of not to worry

Origin of not to worry

The origin of the phrase is unknown. According to Partridge’s Dictionary of Catch Phrases the idiom dates from the mid-1930s with a surge in 1957–8.

Questions about not to worry

What does not to worry mean?
Not to worry means there is no need for concern; there isn't a serious problem.
What part of speech is not to worry?
Not to worry is a phrase.

Words near not to worry in the dictionary

  1. not to put a tooth in it
  2. not to put too fine a point on it
  3. not to put too fine a word on it
  4. not to say
  5. not to speak of
  6. not to worry
  7. not touch with a barge pole
  8. not touch with a ten-foot pole
  9. not up
  10. not want to do that
  11. not wanted on voyage

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: not to worry (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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Cite this entry: “not to worry.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/not_to_worry. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.