What does "toss-up" mean?

A decision in which neither choice is clearly favorable or unfavorable, or for which the outcome does not matter.

What is a synonym for "toss-up"?

Common synonyms include: borderline case, chance, coin toss, contingency, even chance, fair shake.

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Noun

1
A decision in which neither choice is clearly favorable or unfavorable, or for which the outcome does not matter. idiomatic
"It's really a toss-up between the red skirt with blue stripes and the blue skirt with red stripes. They both look good and fit well."
2
an unpredictable phenomenon wordnet
3
Either of two outcomes that are equally likely.
"“He’ll do,” said the Doctor, quietly. “It must have been a toss-up all through the night. ’Think you’re to be congratulated on this case.”"
4
The toss of a coin used to decide some issue.
5
A toss-up question.

"Whether you pick the Lions or Tigers to win, the result will be a toss-up because both teams are equally strong."

Deverbal from toss up.

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