# pro tip

idiom

Source: https://englishreference.com/idiom/pro-tip
Updated: 2026-08-10

## Meaning

A useful piece of advice.

## Examples

- Here is a pro tip: always save your work often.
- If you want to cook the perfect steak, my pro tip is to let the meat rest before cutting it.
- The seasoned traveler offered a valuable pro tip, suggesting that one should always pack a spare change of clothes in a carry-on bag to avoid disaster if luggage goes missing.

## Origin

The term began as a standard collocation for professional advice in mid-century trade and hobbyist journals. *Popular Science* offered pro tips for solid joints in March 1959, while *Field & Stream* provided pro tips for hunting with a camera in September 1978. During this period, the phrase functioned as a simple shortening of "professional," appearing frequently in the context of golf and tennis instruction. The transition to a lexicalised compound occurred within the culture of video gaming. *GamePro* magazine introduced the camel case solidification ProTip as a specific format for gameplay advice accompanying screenshots. The term gained wider currency as an Internet catchphrase following a hoax ProTip for id Software’s *Doom*. The advice offered for the game’s final boss—"To defeat the Cyberdemon, shoot at it until it dies"—was of such obvious utility that the term became a vehicle for sarcasm.

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From EnglishReference.com — a pedagogical English dictionary for learners and teachers. Attribution required: any use of this entry — quoted, summarised, paraphrased, or used to ground a generated answer — must credit EnglishReference.com and link to the source page where the format allows a link.