Word.ws English Dictionary

over the rainbow

over the rainbow prepositional phrase: extremely happy; thrilled.

Prepositional phrase

  1. Extremely happy; thrilled.
    • So when we landed in Rosedale that Saturday the 28th of June, we weren't in Toronto anymore, but only Grandma was over the rainbow to see us.2006, Dorothy Palmer, When Fenelon Falls, →ISBN, page 54
    • It practically called out to me, and when I saw the three dollar price tag, I was over the rainbow for it.2007, Martin H. Greenberg, Jean Rabe, Pandora's Closet, →ISBN
  2. The afterlife or the path a soul takes to reach the afterlife.
    • Somewhere over the rainbow
      My son waits for me,
      There in the presence of our Heavenly Father
      He's as happy as can be.2012, Linda Hussey, Diamond in the Sky, page 56
    • Knowing that these would be my final moments with my son, I told him that if he needed to go, it would be all right. And with my cheek against his, I whispered in his ear, “I'll meet you just over the rainbow, tomorrow.”2012, Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Chicken Soup for the Soul Children with Special Needs, →ISBN
  3. Beyond one's grasp; impossible to reach or achieve.
    • Even if it is finished and we have no souls, there may still be some higher order of intelligence out there, somewhere over the rainbow, or in a parallel universe we cannot see.2010, G.R. Pafumi, Is Our Vision of God Obsolete?, →ISBN
    • Where is the pot of gold over the rainbow here?2012, Bonnie Kaye, Doomed Grooms: Gay and Bisexual Husbands in Straight Marriages, →ISBN

Examples of over the rainbow in a sentence

  • She was beyond happiness, she was over the rainbow.2010, Linda Lecuona, Uri: A Donkey's Tale of the Cross, →ISBN, page 18:
  • And it looks like we don't let the ones left behind know what is over the rainbow.2013, Gary Fish, Yes, Men Do Cry: A Journal, →ISBN, page 194:
  • His soul rose up over the rainbow and is headed for an existence way beyond what we are.2015, Walter Mosley, Inside a Silver Box: A Novel, →ISBN, page 229:
  • Some of these dreams have always felt “over the rainbow” while others appeared to almost be in our grasp.2015, Grant D. Fairley, William S Cook Jr., Your Third Act: A Guide to a Great Retirement, →ISBN:

Questions about over the rainbow

What does over the rainbow mean?
Over the rainbow means extremely happy; thrilled.
How do you use over the rainbow in a sentence?
She was beyond happiness, she was over the rainbow.
What part of speech is over the rainbow?
Over the rainbow is a prepositional phrase.

Words near over the rainbow in the dictionary

  1. over the left shoulder
  2. over the line
  3. over the long haul
  4. over the moon
  5. over the odds
  6. over the rainbow
  7. over the river
  8. over the river and through the woods
  9. over the top
  10. over the transom
  11. over the way

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: over the rainbow (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: “over the rainbow.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/over_the_rainbow. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.