not bad

Idioms

Also, not half bad;; not too shabby. Fairly good, as in Not bad, said the conductor, but we need to play the scherzo again, or The movie wasn't half bad, but Jerry wanted to go home, or Our garden's not too bad this year, or How are things going?—Not too shabby. All of the terms involving bad, which imply that something is less bad than it might be, date from the mid-1700s. The last variant, using shabby in the sense of “inferior,” is slang of the late 1900s.

Example Sentences

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not bad

It’s not bad for someone who just a few years ago needed to work up the courage to see himself as a director.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 18, 2026

“It is not bad for organizations to have more.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 14, 2026

Even unhealthy or bad relationships are not bad 100% of the time.

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 6, 2026

Current deals bring VPN Plus down to $2.99/month on the 2-year plan – not bad for Swiss-level protection.

From Salon ● Jun. 2, 2026

Dimple felt bad for the other girl, but not bad enough to say anything—attention on Seema just meant less on her.

From "When Dimple Met Rishi" by Sandhya Menon

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

not bad

Example Sentences

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