Idiom idiom
feast or famine
Meaning
A situation in which something is always either extremely abundant or in extremely short supply.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“My freelance work is always feast or famine.”
“The restaurant business is feast or famine, with busy weekends followed by very quiet weekdays.”
“The life of a seasonal farmer is often one of feast or famine, depending entirely on the unpredictable nature of the annual harvest.”
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Last updated August 10, 2026