虚有其表 — Chinese idiom
虚有其表
xū yǒu qí biǎo
Traditional: 虛有其表
Meaning
- looks impressive but is worthless
- not as good as it looks
- a reputation with no substance
Character by character
- 虚xūfalse; worthless, hollow, empty; vain
- 有yǒuto have, to own, to possess; to exist
- 其qíhis, her, its, their; that
- 表biǎoto show, to express, to display; outside, appearan
Idioms sharing a character
- 不虚此行 bù xū cǐ xíng
- 乘虚而入 chéng xū ér rù
- 以虚带实 yǐ xū dài shí
- 做贼心虚 zuò zéi xīn xū
- 名不虚传 míng bù xū chuán
- 向壁虚构 xiàng bì xū gòu
- 向壁虚造 xiàng bì xū zào
- 子虚乌有 zǐ xū wū yǒu
- 弄虚作假 nòng xū zuò jiǎ
- 形同虚设 xíng tóng xū shè
Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.