go the extra mile
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
Do more than what is required or expected
Literally: travel an additional mile
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
Strike up some personal rapport with the person in charge Of the centre so that he or she is more likely to go that extra mile for you.
Mr Patten told legislators: ' We wished to go the extra mile and give the Chinese side every opportunity to respond.
British National Corpus sentence via the MAGPIE corpus (CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-30)
Sources & notes
Listed in Wiktionary’s “English idioms” category (retrieved 2026-07-29); definition pending editorial review. Definition drafted by AI (@cf/meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct-fp8-fast) and auto-approved by rule on 2026-07-31; pending editor spot-check.
Common questions
What does “go the extra mile” mean?
Do more than what is required or expected Literally: travel an additional mile
Is “go the extra mile” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.