What does ‘straight from the horse's mouth’ mean?
To “straight from the horse's mouth” means to directly from the most reliable source. The phrase comes from horse-racing, where a tip on a horse's condition was thought most reliable if it came, figuratively, from the horse itself. The idiom is 20th-century and not in Brewer's 1898.
Origin
- The phrase comes from horse-racing, where a tip on a horse's condition was thought most reliable if it came, figuratively, from the horse itself. The idiom is 20th-century and not in Brewer's 1898.
How to use it
- Used when passing on information whose source is authoritative.
- Example: I heard it straight from the horse's mouth — the CEO herself.
Source:
Last verified: 2026-07-18
- Definitions and origins are drawn from public-domain reference works, primarily Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898), with modern usage notes clearly marked.