in the cards

1. Likely or certain to happen, as in I don't think Jim will win—it's just not in the cards. This term, originally put as on the cards, alludes to the cards used in fortune-telling. [Early 1800s]

Example Sentences

Although our desire to hang out remained, the home-cooked meal was suddenly not in the cards.

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Yet even despite its size hurdle, a breakout for AWS in the coming quarters could easily be in the cards—something its acceleration to 20% revenue growth in the third quarter, its best since 2022, seemed to preview.

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With the FactSet consensus anticipating $97 billion in 2026 capex and some analysts thinking $100 billion-plus is in the cards, investors may be looking for more quantitative commentary from Meta’s management this time around.

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“If a broad altcoin rally is still in the cards, it will likely take weeks or months or longer to materialize.”

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Today, Clarke is best known for appearing in a swath of blockbuster hits—including the Oscar-winning “Oppenheimer” and the 2012 thriller “Zero Dark Thirty”—but he has now admitted that pursuing a career on camera never really seemed to be in the cards when he was younger.

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Related Words

• anticipation 
• chance 
• expectation 
• forecast 
• future 
• hope 
• likelihood 
• plan 
• possibility 
• probability 
• promise 
• proposal 
• thought