leave someone in the lurch
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
to abandon or desert someone in a difficult situation
Literally: leave someone in a state of suspense or uncertainty
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
Not to leave them in the lurch afterward!
Burbulis gave his assurance that, while a partial and phased withdrawal of troops was envisaged despite the security agreement, Russia would not leave Armenia " in the lurch ".
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 “leave someone in the lurch” mean?
to abandon or desert someone in a difficult situation Literally: leave someone in a state of suspense or uncertainty
Is “leave someone in the lurch” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.