📖 Meaning
Describes a situation that keeps getting progressively worse over time. It conveys a steady and seemingly relentless decline from an already poor state.
📜 Origin Story
This idiom evolved from a passage in the Daoist text Zhuangzi (庄子·知北游), in which Zhuangzi's disciple Dao Jian asks about the Dao and is told to observe it in increasingly lowly places — from ants and weeds to excrement and urine — meaning the Dao is present even in the most degraded states. The original phrase was "每下愈况" (měi xià yù kuàng), literally 'the further down you go, the more evident it becomes.' Over time, later generations misread and reordered it as "每况愈下," and the meaning shifted from a philosophical point about finding truth everywhere to simply describing a downward spiral.
💡 Example Usage
这家公司的经营状况每况愈下，连续三个季度亏损，裁员也在持续扩大。
This company's business conditions have gone from bad to worse, posting losses for three consecutive quarters while layoffs continue to expand.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 每况愈下
- Pinyin: měi kuàng yù xià
- Literal Translation: every, situation, increasingly, below
- Category: Condition
- Characters: 4