Word.ws English Dictionary

to the letter

to the letter adverb: literally, exactly, following the rules as written.

Adverb

to the letter (not comparable)

  1. (idiomatic) Literally, exactly, following the rules as written.
    • You should follow what your boss said to the letter. Otherwise, you'll lose your job.
    • Capello warned his players that caution was not an option as they went in search of the result that would take England to Euro 2012. And his message was carried out to the letter in the opening exchanges as England played with a tempo and threat Montenegro struggled to subdue.2011, Phil McNulty, “Euro 2012: Montenegro 2-2 England”, in BBC News

to the letter meaning in Malayalam and Myanmar

to the letter in Malayalam

exactly, strictly, precisely
അക്ഷരാർത്ഥത്തിൽ, വാക്കിനുവാക്കായി, പദാനുപദം, പ്രതിപദം, കൃത്യം, നേരേനടുവേ

to the letter in Myanmar

idiomatic for “literally”, following the rules as they're written
တစ်သဝေမတိမ်း tacsa.wema.tim:

Questions about to the letter

What does to the letter mean?
To the letter means literally, exactly, following the rules as written.
What is to the letter in Malayalam?
To the letter in Malayalam is അക്ഷരാർത്ഥത്തിൽ, വാക്കിനുവാക്കായി, പദാനുപദം. See To the letter meaning in Malayalam.
What part of speech is to the letter?
To the letter is an adverb.

Words near to the letter in the dictionary

  1. to the hilt
  2. to the house
  3. to the last
  4. to the last man
  5. to the left
  6. to the letter
  7. to the life
  8. to the limit
  9. to the manner born
  10. to the manor born
  11. to the marrow

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: to the letter (page history and authors); to the letter (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). 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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-to the letter.ogg.

Cite this entry: “to the letter.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/to_the_letter. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.