Meaning
Used of criticism, insults, or warnings that have no effect on someone: they are shrugged off instantly and completely, leaving no trace. Usually said with 'like', as in it was like water off a duck's back. Common in British and American English alike. Informal and conversational; said either with admiration for someone's thick skin or with exasperation at their stubbornness. Regional use: General English.
Origin
The image is literal: a duck's feathers, conditioned with oil from the preen gland, shed water instantly. The earliest figurative use so far traced is Rowland Hill's Village Dialogues (1801), where moral lessons from stage plays 'all ran off' like 'fair water from a duck's back'. Early nineteenth-century citations in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine (1824), The Examiner (1828) and the New Monthly Magazine (1829) all use the older form 'from a duck's back'; the now-standard 'off' form established itself later. Nothing earlier than 1801 is recorded, so the phrase was probably a proverbial image circulating in speech before print caught it.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- like water from a duck's back
- like water off a duck's back
Usage Examples
- Years of hostile reviews had taught the director to treat criticism like water off a duck's back.
- The safety warnings were water off a duck's back to a crew that had cut corners for a decade without consequence.
- I keep pointing out that his new fence sits on my land, but it's like water off a duck's back.