天 公 不 作 美

tiān gōng bù zuò měidictionary entry

Heaven is not cooperating (idiom) / the weather is not favorable for the planned activity

Sources & editorial notes

Reference definitions: CC-CEDICT contributors and MDBG, CC BY-SA 4.0. Source release 2026-10-27T01:55:52Z. Imported 2026-10-27. Definition wording and meaning order are retained. Recognized pronunciation references are displayed with tone marks; the original source record is available below.

Source record: cd-2266bf6c9e98f642. Source SHA-256: bbc4b27f26bee1a262f4d7939667a040c7857c7fc0200a2fa7a86d3352a09eae.

Original source entry:

天公不作美 天公不作美 [tian1 gong1 bu4 zuo4 mei3] /Heaven is not cooperating (idiom)/the weather is not favorable for the planned activity/

Reference definitions and teaching material have separate provenance.

Reference information

The definitions above are from CC-CEDICT. Examples and usage notes are available on selected entries.

Character information

View the individual characters. Their meanings do not necessarily explain the meaning of the whole word.

天
tiān
day / sky / heaven
公
gōng
public / collectively owned / common / international (e.g. high seas, metric system, calendar) / make public / fair / just / Duke, highest of five orders of nobility 五等爵位[wǔ děng jué wèi] / honorable (gentlemen) / father-in-law / male (animal)
不
bù
no / not so / (bound form) not / un-
作
zuō
(bound form) worker / (bound form) workshop / (slang) troublesome / high-maintenance (person)
zuò
to do / to engage in / to write / to compose / to pretend / to feign / to regard as / to consider to be / to be / to act the part of / to feel (itchy, nauseous etc) / writings / works
美
měi
beautiful / very satisfactory / good / to beautify / to be pleased with oneself
Měi
(bound form) the Americas (abbr. for 美洲[Měi zhōu]) / (bound form) USA (abbr. for 美國|美国[Měi guó])

Reference definitions from CC-CEDICT.