Word.ws English Dictionary

what happens twice happens thrice

what happens twice happens thrice phrase: an event that happens two times will happen three times.

Phrase

what happens twice happens thrice

  1. (idiomatic) An event that happens two times will happen three times.

Origin of what happens twice happens thrice

Calque of Japanese 二度ある事は三度ある (“A thing that happens two times will happen three times”)

Questions about what happens twice happens thrice

What does what happens twice happens thrice mean?
What happens twice happens thrice means an event that happens two times will happen three times.
What part of speech is what happens twice happens thrice?
What happens twice happens thrice is a phrase.

Words near what happens twice happens thrice in the dictionary

  1. what good is
  2. what happens in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas
  3. what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas
  4. what happens on the road stays on the road
  5. what happens on tour stays on tour
  6. what happens twice happens thrice
  7. what has been seen cannot be unseen
  8. what has someone done
  9. what hath God wrought
  10. what have you
  11. what ho

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: what happens twice happens thrice (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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