get away with
Idioms-
Escape the consequences or blame for, as in Bill often cheats on exams but usually gets away with it . [Late 1800s]
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get away with murder . Escape the consequences of killing someone; also, do anything one wishes. For example, If the jury doesn't convict him, he'll have gotten away with murder , or He talks all day on the phone—the supervisor is letting him get away with murder . [First half of 1900s]
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.
But in real-life communication, even in our expert languages, we often make mistakes and get away with it.
From Science Daily • May 22, 2026
For Apple, as for Jobs, the whole episode involved the kind of deus ex machina you could never get away with in fiction.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 17, 2026
If ESPN, which is 10% owned by the NFL, can get away with that, why couldn’t they?
From Los Angeles Times • May 15, 2026
"If they can get away with two years what stops them from getting away with 20 years?"
From BBC • Apr. 7, 2026
Not many people can get away with talking about your family like that, but Kat can.
From "A Heart in a Body in the World" by Deb Caletti
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.
