on the edge of one's seat

Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.

Meaning · English

Completely absorbed and excited, often due to suspense or anticipation

Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt

Hoàn toàn hấp dẫn và hứng thú, thường do hồi hộp hoặc mong chờ

Machine-translated — suggest a fix

Literally: physically sitting on the edge of a chair
Where it’s used: Used Widespread English

Examples

The audience was on the edge of their seats during the thriller's climax

AI-drafted example auto-approved by rule (illustrative, not a corpus attestation)

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 “on the edge of one's seat” mean?

Completely absorbed and excited, often due to suspense or anticipation Literally: physically sitting on the edge of a chair

Is “on the edge of one's seat” formal or informal?

No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.