too little, too late

Idioms and Phrases

Inadequate as a remedy and not in time to be effective, as in The effort to divert the stream into a corn field was too little too late—the houses were already flooded . This term originated in the military, where it was applied to reinforcements that were insufficient and arrived too late to be of help. [First half of 1900s]

Related Words

• insufficient
• mere
• minimum
• miserable
• paltry
• puny
• scant
• scanty
• skimpy
• sparse
• tenuous