redeeming feature

Idioms  

1. A good quality or aspect that makes up for other drawbacks, as in The house isn't very attractive, but the garden is the redeeming feature. This idiom, first recorded in 1827, uses redeem in the sense of “compensate.”

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Example Sentences

Its only redeeming feature is that the words are so tiny I can’t read them.

From Washington Post • Dec. 31, 2020

The microphone is good One redeeming feature that the Earphones HD have is a high-quality microphone, which I was told during testing made me sound very clear and easily understandable.

From The Verge • Feb. 8, 2018

The news quickly trended on social media, with tributes saluting the "most famous tree in Australian education" as "majestic" and the university's "only redeeming feature".

From BBC • Oct. 31, 2016

Our critic says its main redeeming feature is Denzel Washington, “a great star, which means that he has that ineluctable what’s-it for selling the goods no matter what their sell-by date.”

From New York Times • Sep. 23, 2016

The whitewashed interior possesses no redeeming feature; unless it be a rather pleasing course of grey marble that runs round on a level with the capitals of the grey columns.

From Cathedral Cities of Italy by Collins, William Wiehe