Meaning & use
feet in mouth
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Meanings
phraseidiominformal
A short form of the saying 'put your foot in your mouth', meaning to say something embarrassing by mistake.
Grammar: Used as a noun phrase after verbs like 'put' or 'have'; the standard idiom uses the singular 'foot'.
Patterns
- put your foot in your mouth
- have your foot in your mouth
I asked her when the baby was due, and she wasn't pregnant — talk about putting my foot in my mouth.
He has a habit of putting his foot in his mouth at dinner parties by mentioning money.
Sorry, that came out wrong; I really put my foot in my mouth there.
phrasefixed phraseinformalhumorous
Used to describe someone who often says the wrong thing and embarrasses themselves.
Grammar: Comes after a linking verb such as 'be' and describes the person, not the words.
Patterns
- be always putting your foot in your mouth
- be the kind of person who puts their foot in their mouth
She's lovely, but she's always putting her foot in her mouth with her boss.
If you're someone who puts your foot in your mouth, it helps to think before you speak.
Common combinations
- put your foot in your mouth
- I put my foot in my mouth when I asked about his ex-wife.
- have your foot in your mouth
- After that comment, I had my foot in my mouth for the rest of the meeting.
- keep putting your foot in your mouth
- He keeps putting his foot in his mouth whenever he talks about politics.
- open mouth, insert foot
- Her email was a classic case of open mouth, insert foot.
Synonyms and how they differ
- blunder
- A blunder is any careless mistake, while 'put your foot in your mouth' is specifically about saying something embarrassing.
- gaffe
- A gaffe is a public mistake, often in speech; it is more formal and can also mean a social slip in behavior.
- slip of the tongue
- This means accidentally saying the wrong word, not necessarily embarrassing the speaker or others.
Word family
- foot-in-mouth adjective
- Used before a noun to describe a remark that causes embarrassment, as in 'a foot-in-mouth moment'.
Commonly confused: feet in mouth or foot in mouth disease? feet in mouth or put your foot down?
feet in mouth vs foot in mouth disease
This is a humorous variation on 'foot-and-mouth disease', which is a serious illness of farm animals; do not confuse the joke with the real disease.
feet in mouth vs put your foot down
This means to be firm and refuse to allow something, which is completely different from embarrassing yourself by speaking.
Practice
Which sentence uses the expression correctly?
Choose one answer.
The fixed idiom uses the singular possessive 'her foot': 'put her foot in her mouth'. Option A wrongly pluralizes 'foot', and options C and D break the fixed wording by dropping or changing the possessive determiner.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “feet in mouth”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.