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Even though there's already a similar question here, mine is a bit different. I want to know if they can be used interchangeably.

This question came to my mind, actually when I was playing Duolingo. I did the Spanish course, and the original Spanish sentence was:

Mi vida no es mejor que la tuya.

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I used Google Translate and the translation is:

My life is no better than yours.

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The key answer (from Duolingo) is

My life isn't better than yours.

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However, my answer was accepted by Duo. Does that mean both can be used interchangeably?

P.S. Please, note that sometimes, Duolingo gives the translations based on the literal meaning from the original language rather than idiomatic English. (That's why I doubt it)

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They do not have precisely the same meaning, but in most cases there is no effective difference in their literal meaning.

My life is not better than yours.

means that it is not the case that my life is better than yours. It is a simple negation.

My life is no better than yours.

means that the degree of goodness in my life is not higher than in your life. It is a scalar negation.

But in use, there will also be a pragmatic distinction. No better than is a relatively unusual construction, and when it is used, it tends to have an implication of judging something or somebody, or that the thing compared is not high in the value of the comparison.

So here, it suggests that your life is not very good, but mine is just as bad. This implication is not there in the not case.

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According to the Cambridge Dictionary, We generally use no before a noun phrase, and not before any other kind of phrase:

He is no genius
He is not going to the party

There are circumstances when either "is no" or "is not" could be used: this is usually true when used before a comparative. As this NGram graph shows, "is no" is used a lot more often than "is not". Both of these sentences are OK:

He is no better than...
He is not better than...

The former can suggest some kind of emotional value judgement, whereas the latter sounds like a simple statement of fact.

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  • 3
    But in the question, no is not used before a noun phrase, so the first paragraph is irrelevant.
    – Colin Fine
    Commented Oct 17, 2021 at 10:58
  • 2
    @ColinFine the question title is "The general difference between 'is no' and 'is not'". Note the highlighted word.
    – JavaLatte
    Commented Oct 17, 2021 at 13:05
  • You're right, that was the title. We very often get questions whose titles read as if they are general, but they are actually about a specific construction. They don't usually say "general" in the title though.
    – Colin Fine
    Commented Oct 17, 2021 at 13:12
  • Maybe "is no better" is used a lot more than "is not better" because the latter is a bit awkward. I reckon most speakers would say "is worse" rather than "is not better". Depending on context, as usual. (Most, except perhaps some mathematicians, computer scientist and the like. ;-P )
    – Pablo H
    Commented Oct 18, 2021 at 13:41
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When you negate a sentence, there are often multiple ways which part of the sentence exactly to negate.

Let's look at a simple sentence to illustrate the idea first:

A turtle is not a bird.

Here, the negation is applied to the predicate. You could structure the sentence as

(A turtle) (is not) (a bird).

In contrast, with

A turtle is no bird.

the negation is applied to the bird, so to speak. The structure would be

(A turtle) (is) (no bird).

In your example sentence, the two alternatives are

(My live) (is not) (better than yours).

(My live) (is) (no better than yours).

This is more a distinction of "language mechanics", so to speak, and doesn't have any real influence on the meaning in English. So, the two versions are basically two different routes to get to the same destination and can be used interchangeably (I won't rule out that there are cases where it does make a difference, but I haven't run into any examples in English so far ;) ).

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6
  • However, "(all (that shines)) (is not) (gold)" is identical to "(not all (that shines)) (is) (gold)"...
    – iBug
    Commented Oct 18, 2021 at 6:01
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    @iBug Um, no it's not? Neither from the construction, nor from the meaning side of things.
    – Henning Kockerbeck
    Commented Oct 18, 2021 at 8:20
  • The placement of "not" is a red herring. With all parentheses stripped, "all that shines is not gold" means exactly the same as "not all that shines is gold". Here's a thread on EL&U.
    – iBug
    Commented Oct 18, 2021 at 8:47
  • I was just sharing that example as an "appendix" or trivia to your argument of "where the negation is applied".
    – iBug
    Commented Oct 18, 2021 at 8:48
  • @iBug OK, it seems like a native speaker would interpret "all that shines is not gold" differently than I did. I'd actually read it as "(all that shines) (is not) (gold)".
    – Henning Kockerbeck
    Commented Oct 18, 2021 at 9:03

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