scare the pants off (you)

to frighten you very much.

Spiders scare the pants off me.

Usage notes: also used with other verbs to emphasize an extreme reaction: Sunbathing bores the pants off me.

Hugh always beats the pants off me in tennis.

Related vocabulary: scare the hell out of you, scare you to death

• be at odds with
• be at odds with something
• be a tough act to follow
• be at pains
• be at pains to do something
• be at peace with the world
• be at sea
• be at sixes and sevens
• beats me
• beat someone at own game
• beat someone at their own game
• beat someone down
• beat someone hands down
• beat someone hollow
• be at someone's beck and call
• beat someone's brains out
• beat someone to a pulp
• beat someone to it
• beat someone to the punch
• beat someone to within an inch of life
• beat someone to within an inch of their life
• beat someone up
• beat swords into ploughshares
• be at the bottom of
• be at the bottom of something