boil down
Britishverb
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to reduce or be reduced in quantity and usually altered in consistency by boiling
to boil a liquid down to a thick glue
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(intr) to be the essential element in something
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(tr) to summarize; reduce to essentials
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Simplify, summarize, or shorten, as in John finally managed to boil his thesis down to 200 pages .
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boil down to . Be reducible to basic elements, be equivalent to. For example, What this issue boils down to is that the council doesn't want to spend more money . These metaphoric usages allude to reducing and concentrating a substance by boiling off liquid. [Late 1800s]
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.
Their stories are sometimes convoluted, but at bottom they boil down to the same three elements: salt, wind and water.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 29, 2026
What is especially galling, some victims said, is that their compensation for years of fighting for justice will boil down to a day’s pay for a Purdue attorney like Huebner, who charges $2,935 an hour.
From Salon • Apr. 24, 2026
This could boil down to Sam Darnold versus Matthew Stafford.
From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 24, 2026
The options essentially boil down to working longer and retiring later, increasing savings now, or decreasing your lifestyle expenses, Williams said.
From MarketWatch • Dec. 15, 2025
We used to discuss some of these matters, but we both knew the question would boil down to my saying, “Ted, you decide.”
From "The Joy Luck Club" by Amy Tan
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.
