outdo

Etymology

It is formed from English out- + do.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} For the first sense the OED compares the phrasal verb “do out”,^[2] and its 1989 edition notes that the parts were still written separately in Middle English.^[7] The Middle English Dictionary has only a participle outdōn, formed with idōn, the past participle of dōn (“to do”).^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

To put or force out, to disallow or ignore: about 1300, in the life of Thomas Becket in the South English Legendary (bote þat was out i-do).^[2][8] Dictionary.com dates the word to 1300–50.^[9]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English the participle also meant expelled (Adam out don, naked, in the Cursor Mundi) and excessive (towers of out-done hight).^[8] The first sense died out in the early 17th century,^[2][5] just as the modern sense, "to surpass, excel", appeared: in Shakespeare's Coriolanus, which the OED now dates before 1616 and its 1989 edition to 1607,^[2][7] while Etymonline gives about 1600 and the Collegiate 1607.^[3][10] The verb is often passive, especially in not to be outdone.^[2] Johnson (1755) defined it as "to excel; to surpass; to perform beyond another", quoting Shakespeare's "He hath in this action outdone his former deeds doubly".^[11] From 1677 it also meant to beat or defeat, and to exhaust, a sense now chiefly regional American.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 1300 – to put or force out; to disallow or ignore (obsolete by 1619).^[2][8]
• c. 1425 – participle, excessive.^[8]
• before 1616 – to surpass, excel.^[2] The 1989 edition of the OED and the Collegiate date it to 1607.^[7][10]
• 1677 – to beat, defeat, overcome; to exhaust.^[2]

Meanings

Verb

1. To do better than; to surpass or excel: The young team outdid the champions in every round.^{[12][4][13][2]}
2. outdo oneself: to do better than one ever has before.^[4][5]
3. To defeat or overcome; in regional American use, to exhaust.^[4][2]
4. (obsolete, 1300–1619) To put or force out.^[2][5][7]

Related words

• do

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
7. ^ a b c d Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c d e Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
9. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
10. ^ a b Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
13. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin