throw cold water on
Proposed by a contributor, not yet supported by evidence.
Meaning · English
to discourage or express disapproval of an idea
Nghĩa · Tiếng Việt
làm giảm sự nhiệt tình hoặc thể hiện sự không đồng ý với một ý tưởng
Machine-translated — suggest a fix
Literally: to splash cold water on something
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
But now Strauss - Kahn is throwing cold water on proposals to tax international flows of “ hot money. ”
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 “throw cold water on” mean?
to discourage or express disapproval of an idea Literally: to splash cold water on something
Is “throw cold water on” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.