Start over means to begin again: to redo a piece of work from the very beginning or to make a fresh start in life. In the first sense, people talk about a task, a text or a game; in the second, about moving, a new job or life after a setback. It's mainly American, but it's understood everywhere.
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start over; start + task/game + over; start over in + new place; start over from scratch
- The printer jammed halfway through the contract, so I had to start over with fresh paper.
- After the divorce, she moved to Lisbon to start over in a city where nobody knew her.
- If you make a mistake on the form, don't start over; just correct that line.
What changed
First versionI lost all my notes before the exam, so I had to start from zero.
RevisionI lost all my notes before the exam, so I had to start over.
Start from zero is understandable, but it isn't what people say. You need start over or the fixed phrase start from scratch. A scratch is literally a thin mark on a surface, and that's where English begins when it starts from nothing.
In British English, start again is more common in the same sense: Let's start again from page one. Start over is understood there too, but it sounds American. Start out is something else entirely: to begin a journey or a career, She started out as a waitress.
Your turn
My essay file got corrupted and I lost three pages, so I had to ___.
Show the answer
start over — Three pages were lost and the work had to be done again, so start over. Start out means to begin a career or a journey, and it doesn't fit a lost file.
Describe a time when you had to start something over. Say what went wrong.
When my laptop crashed before I had saved the presentation, I had to start over and rebuild all twelve slides.
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