What does "one-on-one" mean?

A contest involving only one player on each side, especially of an activity often involving teams.

What is a synonym for "one-on-one"?

Common synonyms include: man-to-man, one-to-one, person-to-person, triple o.

adj, adv, noun

adj, adv, noun ·3 syllables ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Noun

1
A contest involving only one player on each side, especially of an activity often involving teams. countable, uncountable
"Why don't we play a little one-on-one until the others show up."

Adjective

1
Involving direct communication or competition between two people. Australia, Canada, US, not-comparable
"Such one-on-one “swearing contests” are routinely decided in favor of law enforcement officers, but in this case the district court sided with the accused bank robber."
2
Involving one attacker and one defender. not-comparable
"After several near misses, Van Persie finally reached three figures by turning in Walcott's cross before Jaaskelainen saved from Walcott when one-on-one."
3
bijective or injective not-comparable

Adjective

1
being a system of play in which an individual defensive player guards an individual offensive player wordnet
2
directly between two individuals wordnet

Adverb

1
In a one-on-one manner. not-comparable
"He was willing to go one-on-one with the District Attorney himself."

Adverb

"I would like to meet with him one-on-one to discuss the matter."

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.