rain cats and dogs

/reɪn kæts ən dɑgz/

/reɪn kæts ən dɒgz/

Other forms: raining cats and dogs; rained cats and dogs; rains cats and dogs

If it's going to rain cats and dogs later today, you'll want to bring an umbrella with you. To rain cats and dogs is to rain extremely hard, or to pour.

When it rains cats and dogs, you tend to get very wet. The saying presents an interesting image, of animals falling from the sky, that doesn't seem to have much to do with torrential rain, and experts aren't certain about its origin. The most likely — and least appealing — theory is that rain storms in 17th century England would carry the bodies of dead animals through the dirty city streets, inspiring people to say, "it's raining cats and dogs."

Definitions of rain cats and dogs

1. verb

   rain heavily
   synonyms: pelt, pour, rain buckets, stream

   types:

   sheet

   come down as if in sheets

   sluice, sluice down

   pour as if from a sluice

   type of:

   rain, rain down

   precipitate as rain