防微杜渐 — Chinese idiom

Meaning

• to nip in the bud

Character by character

• 防fángto protect, to defend, to guard against
• 微wēismall, tiny, trifling; micro-
• 杜dùto prevent, to restrict, to stop; surname
• 渐jiàngradually

Idioms sharing a character

• 以防万一 yǐ fáng wàn yī
• 防不胜防 fáng bù shèng fáng
• 防患未然 fáng huàn wèi rán
• 防患未萌 fáng huàn wèi méng
• 人微言轻 rén wēi yán qīng
• 微不足道 wēi bù zú dào
• 微乎其微 wēi hū qí wēi
• 微言大义 wēi yán dà yì
• 渺乎其微 miǎo hū qí wēi
• 无微不至 wú wēi bù zhì

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.