Dictionary.com
Thesaurus.com
Showing results for in a nutshell. Search instead for spiny+softshell.
Synonyms

in a nutshell

Idioms  

  1. Concisely, in a few words, as in Here's our proposal—in a nutshell, we want to sell the business to you. This hyperbolic expression alludes to the Roman writer Pliny's description of Homer's Iliad being copied in so tiny a hand that it could fit in a nutshell. For a time it referred to anything compressed, but from the 1500s on it referred mainly to written or spoken words.

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Dimon, in a nutshell, told him to stop lying on TV, according to people familiar with the conversation.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 30, 2026

"My life is basically Brentford, in a nutshell," she said.

From BBC • Nov. 14, 2025

“That, in a nutshell, is the entertainment business.”

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 13, 2025

White’s warning is, in a nutshell: “It’s not for everyone.”

From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 12, 2024

The universe was contained in a nutshell, ensconced comfortably within the sphere of fixed stars; the cosmos was finite in extent, and entirely filled with matter.

From "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea" by Charles Seife

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.