MEANING
To miss the overall situation because you are concentrating too closely on its details.
Use it for
describing attention to detail that hides the larger issue; asking someone to step back and see the overall pattern; criticizing analysis that loses sight of its purpose; distinguishing detailed knowledge from broad understandingNames failure to grasp the larger situation because individual details dominate attention. Writing functions: Perspective / Excessive attention to detail. Semantic categories (by meaning): Perspective / Excessive attention to detail. Contexts: General conversation; Creative prose.
Words that belong together
- cannot see the wood for the trees
- cannot see the forest for the trees
On the page
We have compared every sentence but still cannot see the wood for the trees.
The summary helped readers who could not see the forest for the trees.
Word forms
- Base
- not see the wood for the trees
Usage notes
Usually cannot/can’t see the wood for the trees. American variant cannot see the forest for the trees. Wood or forest stays singular; trees stays plural. Register: neutral. Commonness: moderately common (qualitative editorial estimate, informed by dictionaries/corpus).
Practice this word in a sentenceYour margin notes
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