物极必反 — Chinese idiom

Meaning

• when things reach an extreme, they can only move in the opposite direction

Character by character

• 物wùthing, substance, matter; creature
• 极jíextreme, top; final, furthest, utmost; pole
• 必bìsurely, certainly; must; will
• 反fǎnreverse, opposite; contrary, anti-

Idioms sharing a character

• 价廉物美 jià lián wù měi
• 博物洽闻 bó wù qià wén
• 厚德载物 hòu dé zài wù
• 囊中取物 náng zhōng qǔ wù
• 地大物博 dì dà wù bó
• 待人接物 dài rén jiē wù
• 恃才傲物 shì cái ào wù
• 探囊取物 tàn náng qǔ wù
• 格物致知 gé wù zhì zhī
• 残民害物 cán mín hài wù

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