before you know it

1. see under before you can say Jack Robinson.

Example Sentences

"I ended up in Spain, lived in one for 13 months as a hippy on a strawberry farm, then came back and started a business. Before you know it, I had 180 workers in 28 Transit vans driving around London."

From BBC

A whir of arms, a flick of his wrist, and the ball has hit you before you know it.

From BBC

There’s that Margaret Atwood quote that defines the whole show that we use, which is, “Nothing changes instantaneously. In a gradually heating bathtub, you’d be boiled to death before you know it.”

From Los Angeles Times

“Next thing you know, you want to go a little bigger. You’re making those little poppers. Next, you want to get a little louder. You start making these little rockets. But they only go so far. ... Now you’re doing more of a homemade gunpowder. Before you know it, you just gone too far.”

From Los Angeles Times

He added: "The distress would require to be recent for it to be seen as corroboration, but case law can develop and develop, and before you know it, we've got a case where the distress is seen five years after the event, and the appeal court just waive it through, and that standard of evidence is lowered again."

From BBC

Related Words

• immediately 
• soon