short of

English

Phrase

short of

1. Except; but; without resorting to; up to the point of.

   He tried everything short of lending her the money himself.

   Short of a miracle, nothing/little short of kneeling before your boss will do.

2. Insufficiently equipped with.

   He's a nice person, but a bit short of brains.

3. Less than.

   An Olympic athlete cannot perform at any level short of world-class.

   • 2025 November 3, Alex Kozul-Wright and News Agencies, “UK train stabbing attack – how it unfolded and what we know now”, in Aljazeera‎^[1]:

     By Sunday night, police said only one remained in a life-threatening condition: a railway staff member who tried to stop the attack. Police called his actions “nothing short of heroic”.

Usage notes

• "Short of" is often used in full-deckisms such as "a few sandwiches short of a picnic" (i.e. "foolish" or "insane"). See a few X short of a Y in Appendix:English snowclones.

Derived terms

• three stops short of Dagenham

Translations

except — see except

insufficiently equipped with

• Armenian: please add this translation if you can
• French: à court (fr) de
• Galician: please add this translation if you can
• German: knapp mit, Mangel an (haben)
• Hungarian: szűkében van, szűkölködik (hu), hiányt szenved (hu)
• Plautdietsch: please add this translation if you can
• Polish: brakować (pl) (used in the third person neuter, the person lacking in the dative)
• Scottish Gaelic: gann de
• Welsh: please add this translation if you can

less than