tough break

Idioms  

1. Also, tough luck. A trying or troublesome circumstance, bad luck, as in He got a tough break when he was denied a raise, or Tough luck for the team last night. This idiom uses tough in the sense of “difficult,” a usage dating from the early 1600s. The variant is also used as a sarcastic interjection, as in So you didn't make straight A's—tough luck! A slangy variant of this interjection is tough beans, and a ruder version is tough shit. [Colloquial; c. 1900]

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Example Sentences

This is a tough break, but it may not be as bad as you think.

From MarketWatch • Jun. 5, 2026

“It’s a tough break for us as a team when you see something like that, a great player, a great leader,” cornerback Patrick Surtain II said.

From Washington Times • Jul. 31, 2023

It’s a tough break for Wolfe, who rose up the depth chart in spring and expressed hope that he had finally found the right offense for his skill set.

From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 13, 2022

It’s another tough break for the struggling White Sox, who have been hit hard by injuries this year.

From Seattle Times • May 29, 2022

But it was a tough break for Frank—morganatic marriage and all that.

From Astounding Stories of Super-Science, August 1930 by Bates, Harry

Related Words

• adversity
• calamity
• catastrophe
• danger
• difficulty
• disaster
• discomfort
• fatigue
• grief
• hazard
• injury
• misery
• misfortune
• oppression
• peril
• persecution
• sorrow
• suffering
• torment
• trouble