you never know

English

Phrase

you never know

1. Used to speculate about a possibility; especially, a slight one.

   At this point, I doubt that they'll meet their deadline, but you never know — stranger things have happened.

   • 8 October 2010, Colin Jackson for BBC Sport, 'Magic can happen between Turner and Sharman'

     They are only running times in the 13.20s, but next year he could run 13.25 and you never know, he may end up running 13.1 quite easily

Related terms

• what do you know
• who knows

 

Translations

phrase used to speculate about a slim chance

• Finnish: ei sitä koskaan tiedä
• French: sait-on jamais (fr), on ne sait jamais (fr)
• German: man kann nie wissen, man weiß nie
• Luxembourgish: et weess een ni
• Norwegian Nynorsk: ikkje godt å vita
• Polish: nigdy nie wiadomo
• Russian: как знать (kak znatʹ), кто зна́ет (kto znájet), чем чёрт не шу́тит (čem čort ne šútit)
• Spanish: nunca se sabe, uno nunca sabe m, una nunca sabe f, quién quita