off guard

Idioms  

1. Also, off one's guard. Not watchful, easily surprised. It is often put as catch (or be caught) off guard, meaning “take (or be taken) by surprise.” For example, The securities analyst was caught off guard by that financial report, or With any luck the boss will be off guard when I come in late. [Late 1600s] The antonym, on guard or on one's guard, meaning “watchful or prepared, especially to defend oneself,” was first recorded in 1577. For example, In this crowd we must be on guard against pickpockets, or I'm always on my guard when I'm asked how I voted.

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Example Sentences

Even so, the outrage seemed to catch everyone off guard.

From Salon • Jun. 22, 2026

But the machinery he dislikes was built in 1999, when the Fed first began signaling a hike before it moved because it didn’t want to catch markets off guard.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 19, 2026

Beyond establishing foreign citizenship, there are numerous financial hurdles that often catch aspiring renunciants off guard:

From MarketWatch • Jun. 17, 2026

He used his fastball to get to two strikes, too, catching Marsh off guard with, as Wrobleski put it, “a modified, slide-step, out-of-the-windup fastball” off the plate.

From Los Angeles Times • May 30, 2026

It still catches me off guard that this isn’t some random anomaly of a weekend.

From "Leah on the Offbeat" by Becky Albertalli