English Explanatory Dictionary

dial it in

English dictionary entry

Meanings

verb
  1. To set up in a perfect or complete way.
  2. To give a lackluster, uninspired, or timid performance (especially when capable of doing better); to phone it in.

Word forms

dial it in dials it in dialing it in dialling it in dialed it in dialled it in

Etymology

* (set up well): Often, complex systems have many dials, which need to be tweaked for optimal performance. Thus, dialing it in involves moving the various dials until the system is performing better. Very probably, it began as a military term used in artillery and naval gunnery; e.g. "We have the enemy dialed in."

This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
Back to search All on D Russian dictionary Dahl dictionary