No more than vs. not more than

July 3, 2008 7:01 AM

What is the difference between "no more than" and "not more than"?

A friend of mine who is learning English (Japanese is her native language) brought me this question, and I couldn't come up with a satisfactory explanation.

The example she gave was:
"Mr. Smith wrote no more than ten letters."
"Mr. Smith wrote not more than ten letters."

I feel that there is some difference in nuance, but I can't quite put it into words (and as a native speaker, my limited grammar education isn't doing much to help - the closest I can come is that "not" is only ever an adverb, while "no" has somewhat broader applicability?).

Specific situations where only one of the two would be correct would also help a lot.

Thank you very much!

posted by Arasithil to writing & language (15 comments total)

The first is less harsh/strict sounding.

The second is focused on the hard limit of ten letters.

In both, the possibility exists that Mr. Smith wrote no letters, but it seems less likely with the first example.
posted by amtho at 7:11 AM on July 3

I would associate "no more than" with an upper bound on uncertainty, and "not more than" with a hard cap. E.g., "Mr. Smith might have written six or seven letters, but definitely no more than ten" versus "Mr. Smith was under strict instructions to write not more than ten letters."
posted by shadow vector at 7:14 AM on July 3

I would say that "no more than" is neutral, just stating a fact: "this was the maximum number." "Not more than" is either emphatic (in kind of a folksy way?) or bureaucratese/legalese ("the papers are to be filed not more than 30 days from ...").

But really, "not more than" is so idiomatic that if someone is just learning English they should probably just not use it. Stick to "no more than." It's the kind of phrase that might sound right coming from a native speaker but people will assume is wrong if a non-native speaker uses it.
posted by Jaltcoh at 7:16 AM on July 3

Yes, I too think of "not more than" as legalese or a forced restriction.

IANALinguist, though.
posted by fogster at 7:20 AM on July 3

These sort of questions come up all the time in patent claim drafting discussions, but I am not aware of "no more than" versus "not more than" ever being in dispute. You pretty commonly see both used in patent claims so I guess the answer (at least in that context) is no difference.

This is one of those shrug your shoulders and say "English doesn't always follow strict rules" sort of answer. For shizzle.
posted by three blind mice at 7:25 AM on July 3

I agree that the difference is in the degree of emphasis: 'No more than' is a request or an instruction. 'Not more than' is a command.
posted by dowcrag at 7:25 AM on July 3

Tell your friend to spend her time learning more useful parts of the English language. If there is a difference here, it is very small.
posted by Dec One at 8:09 AM on July 3 [1 favorite]

I am a native English speaker from London UK.

I've tested this out in my head with a bunch of different examples, and I can't really detect any difference.

I suspect one or other might be generally more common in different english speaking regions. From this side of the Atlantic "not more than" sounds just as good as "no more than", so I think Jaltcoh is on the right track describing this as an idiomatic difference, rather than any real difference in inherent meaning.
posted by roofus at 8:16 AM on July 3 [1 favorite]

Just seems a nuanced difference to me. There's no difference in meaning (i.e. ten is still the maximum number of letters written). "Not more than" sounds a bit stiffer and emphasizes the limit (as a limit) a bit more than the more common "no more than."
posted by wheat at 8:18 AM on July 3

I don't think there's any significant difference.
posted by ludwig_van at 8:31 AM on July 3

Consider the following use cases¹:

x27;Women who smoke are no more likely than men to get lung cancer...Our findings suggest that women are not more susceptible than men to the carcinogenic effects of cigarette smoking in the lung".x27;

x27;Keanu Reeves is "certainly not more important than the president of the United States."...attorney Joseph Farzam also aruged that Reeves is no more "popular than O.J. Simpson".x27;

In both these examples no more is used in a way that puts the emphasis on comparison, when not more than is used the emphasis is on negation (in the first example the implicit suggestion is that it was thought that women are more susceptible). This seems to me similar to other patterns of use. cf

When it comes to language tallus is...

no more likely to be correct than other posters.

not as knowledgeable as languagehat. (not more knowledgeable than)


1. found by typing "no more" "no more" into Google
posted by tallus at 8:43 AM on July 3 [2 favorites]

Using this example:

Women who smoke are no more likely than men to get cancer...

Women who smoke are not more likely than men...

The difference is that the first could read "Women are just as likely..." but the second one, you cannot (and maintain meaning.)

So I think "no more than" is more an equivalency, she wrote some letters, maybe several, possibly as many as ten, but that's all. As opposed to, she definitely wrote a lot of letters, but she stopped at ten, specifically.
posted by headspace at 9:20 AM on July 3

English is NOT logical. That is the rule. (People trying to fabricate rules in an effort to explain it is probably how it got so messed up in the first place.) The explanation is always 'just because'. Take note of the things and eventually you begin to see the patterns. Read as much as possible and it will start to click. One day you'll read something and think "That's.. not right." Logically it could be right, but it's not. And why? Just because.
posted by mu~ha~ha~ha~har at 10:25 AM on July 3

no more than 10 = less than 10

not more than = less than or equal to 10

That's how it seems to me.
posted by whimsicalnymph at 12:48 PM on July 3

No, they both mean less than or equal to 10.
posted by Jaltcoh at 11:24 PM on July 4