A wild goose chase is a long search for something you are unlikely to find. The phrase fits when people spend a lot of time looking for something that doesn't exist or is almost impossible to find, often because of wrong information. The idiom is informal; in an essay, you can write a pointless search.
When would you say a wild goose chase?
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be a wild goose chase; send someone on a wild goose chase; go on a wild goose chase
- The old map sent the tourists on a wild goose chase around the city centre.
- I spent the afternoon on a wild goose chase for a charger that nobody in the office had.
What changed
First versionLooking for that café without an address was a wild geese chase.
RevisionLooking for that café without an address was a wild goose chase.
Geese may seem logical if you picture chasing a whole flock. But when one noun stands before another and describes it, it usually stays singular: a shoe shop, not a shoes shop. The same goes for a wild goose chase.
A red herring is a false clue, something that distracts from what matters. A wild goose chase is the useless search that such a clue often leads to: The anonymous tip was a red herring that sent the police on a wild goose chase.
Your turn
We drove to three pharmacies for the medicine, but none of them had it, so the whole trip was ___.
Show the answer
a wild goose chase — We drove to three pharmacies and found nothing, which is a pointless search, so a wild goose chase. A piece of cake means something very easy, and a fruitless drive around town is anything but easy.
Describe a time when you spent a long time looking for something and never found it. Say what you were looking for and who or what misled you.
A friend told me that a bookshop near the station sold used textbooks, but it was a wild goose chase because the shop had turned into a bakery.
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