敷衍了事 — Chinese idiom
敷衍了事
fū yǎn liǎo shì
Meaning
- to do things half-heartedly; to merely go through the motions
Character by character
- 敷fūto apply, to paint, to spread
- 衍yǎnto overflow; to spread out
- 了liǎoclear; to finish; particle of completed action
- 事shìaffair, matter, business; to serve; accident, inci
Idioms sharing a character
- 敷衍塞责 fū yǎn sè zé
- 一了百了 yī liǎo bǎi liǎo
- 一目了然 yī mù liǎo rán
- 了如指掌 liǎo rú zhǐ zhǎng
- 了无生趣 liǎo wú shēng qù
- 了然于胸 liǎo rán yú xiōng
- 前缘未了 qián yuán wèi liǎo
- 直截了当 zhí jié liǎo dàng
- 脸都绿了 liǎn dōu lǜ le
- 一事无成 yī shì wú chéng
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.