Meaning & use
long story short
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Meaning
phrasefixed phraseinformal
Said before giving only the main result of an event, to avoid telling all the details.
Grammar: Comes at the start of a sentence and is followed by a comma: long story short, we lost.
Patterns
- long story short, we did something
Long story short, we missed the flight and spent the night at the airport.
Long story short, she got the job and moved to Denver.
I'll skip the details: long story short, the deal fell through.
Common combinations
- long story short, we
- Long story short, we ended up staying home.
- to make a long story short
- To make a long story short, he quit.
- long story short, I
- Long story short, I paid for the repairs myself.
- anyway, long story short
- Anyway, long story short, it all worked out.
Synonyms and how they differ
- in short
- In short is neutral and works in writing, while long story short is chatty and mostly spoken.
- to cut a long story short
- This is the British full form and means exactly the same, but it is longer and a little more formal.
- basically
- Basically can open a summary too, but it does not announce that you are skipping details.
Word family
Commonly confused: long story short or long story?
long story short vs long story
It's a long story means you decline to explain. Long story short means you do explain, but only the end result.
Practice
Long story short, we got lost and arrived two hours late. What does the speaker do here?
Choose one answer.
Long story short introduces a short summary of the result. Refusing to explain is the job of it's a long story, the tempting wrong option.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “long story short”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.