a hair's breadth

hair's breadth

A very small amount or short length. After wandering around the forest for an hour thinking we were lost, it turned out that we were only a hair's breadth away from our campsite. The seal is air-tight—there's not a hair's breadth between the door and the frame.
See also: breadth
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

a hair's breadth

1. You use a hair's breadth to talk about the smallest possible amount or degree of something. The town suffered heavy bombing, coming within a hair's breadth of being destroyed altogether. He missed the two-minute barrier by a hair's breadth, finishing in 2.00.04 and setting a new British record. The situation was a hair's breadth away from being comical.
2. You use a hair's breadth to talk about the smallest possible distance. A stone flew past him, missing him by a hair's breadth. His head was a hair's breadth away from the car roof.
See also: breadth
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed.

a hair's breadth

a very small amount or margin.
See also: breadth
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary

a ˈhair’s breadth

a very small distance or amount: He escaped death by a hair’s breadth. If the other car had been going any faster, he would certainly have been killed. She was within a hair’s breadth of winning.
Breadth means width.
See also: breadth
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary
See also:
  • hair's breadth
  • breadth
  • by a hair's breadth
  • come within a hair's breadth of (someone or something)
  • within a hair's breadth of (something)
  • brace of shakes
  • in a brace of shakes
  • jump across
  • spread across (something or some place)
  • explain
References in classic literature
As if that money could add a hair's breadth to happiness or peace of mind.
If VAR can decide a player has been offside by a hair's breadth, surely it should decide whether or not a keeper has broken the law in order to stop an opponent scoring?
Isis Brantley is a hair's breadth away from the end of her decades-long battle with the state to practice and teach African hair braiding in Texas, after a measure to deregulate the industry passed the Texas Senate on Wednesday and will head to Gov.
SARAJEVO, Dec 29 (KUNA) -- Initial results of the first round of Croatian presidency elections showed incumbent Ivo Josipovic winning by a hair's breadth. By the slight margin of 1.33 percent against Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic of the opposition Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), Josipovic, who is supported by the ruling Social Democratic Party (SDP) won 38.56 percent compared to 37.5 to Kitarovic according to results based on returns from 99 percent of polling stations.
at Caernarfon Crown Court, judge Niclas Parry told him: "This was vigilante behaviour and because of it you have come within a hair's breadth of going into immediate custody."
Working on the nanoscale, which is 80,000 times smaller than a hair's breadth, the team have woven threads of atoms into the shape of five-point stars, creating building blocks of materials which are flexible and potentially shock absorbent.
There was a hair's breadth between the duo at the end of Q2, but come the conclusion to the top-10 shoot-out, Vettel blew everybody away.
Ninety-five of these are considered "near Earth asteroids" meaning they are 30 million miles away, almost a third of the way to the Sun, yet a hair's breadth in terms of the size of our solar system, reports Discovery News.
It's become like playing two-wheeled dodgems as speeding hoodies zip past on the pavement just a hair's breadth away.
Meyer's description of the lovers' emotions is palpable, and readers will be drawn into the couple's spiraling dance, feeling the intense longing that comes from being a hair's breadth away from the thing you want most in the world.
And it's only a hair's breadth of logic away in a mind that accepts this, that the rational response to Haddon's question is, you be a good parent by killing your kids.
Jeffrey Kimble, mounted a pair of extraordinarily reflective mirrors half a hair's breadth apart in a vacuum chamber.
Chair of the bench Melvin Marks said: 'The management of Spearmint Rhino should be fully aware that they came within a hair's breadth of losing their licence.'
There's a hair's breadth between those who get enjoyment from looking at these pictures and those who make them.
"One of the difficulties of manufacturing a smooth safety surface is that you are forced either to rely solely on the skid-resistant nature of the material itself (such as rubber or smooth vinyl floors) or to embed a skid-resistant material with traction-enhancing grit (such as carborundum or aluminum-oxide chips) that stand a hair's breadth above any moisture to 'claw' into the shoes of passersby, helping to reduce the risk of slips and falls.