Is "no good" or "it is no good" gramatically correct English?

Question

I recently came across some discussion on the fact that "no bueno" is not gramatically correct Spanish, and generally not a phrase Spanish-speakers use, unless they find it funny. Of course, "no bueno" is just a literal translation of the common English phrase "no good". Sometimes, the phrase appears with the implied subject/verb attached: "it is no good" or "this is no good" (accompanied by a sad shake of the head, or a downcast expression).

One can of course say "It/This is not good" or for short "not good", which is unimpeachably fine grammar, but I'm not so sure on the "official grammatical status" of just "no good".

Note: there is the hyphenation "no-good", which can be used as an adjective, but that is not the usage I'm talking about in this post.

What do you mean by "official grammatical status"? It's a fixed phrase; it doesn't really have any internal structure. — alphabet, Oct 13 '23 at 04:48
@alphabet I'm comparing the situation to the Spanish situation of "no bueno", which Spanish speakers invariably say is not correct grammatically. I'm wondering if English speakers also think "no good" is incorrect grammatically. — D.R, Oct 13 '23 at 07:09
I've never heard anyone say so. Presumably it is no good to... = it is of no benefit to... — Kate Bunting, Oct 13 '23 at 08:16
@alphabet ????? It's a noun phrase with an uncountable common noun as (ultimate) Head and a nagative existential determinaticve in Determiner function. It contrasts with phrases like some good. It can have modifiers such as discernible or patracticable or short term etc etc. Have you been smoking racoons again? ;-) — Araucaria - Him, Oct 13 '23 at 08:54
@Araucaria-Him "The movie was no discernible good" and "The movie was some good" both sound wrong to me. "The movie wasn't any good" sounds fine, though. Hrm. — alphabet, Oct 13 '23 at 12:31
Does this answer your question? On what grounds does one determine the grammatical acceptability of a sentence fragment group? Or this, one of many questions about conversational deletion? "Best believe." as a rhetorical device or device of storytelling // "No good." is less common than "Good!" and not directed against the addressee. — Edwin Ashworth, Oct 13 '23 at 13:42
In casual speech we don't always use full, grammatical sentences. "No" has no grammar, but it can be the answer to many questions. And "No good" or "Not good" could be the answer to "What did you think of the movie?" — Barmar, Oct 13 '23 at 14:28
@Araucaria-Him Hrm. When it's hyphenated (as "no-good") it's pretty clearly been reanalyzed as an adjective; I think that "no good" could be read as a non-hyphenated version of that or as a normal NP. — alphabet, Oct 13 '23 at 21:56

Is "no good" or "it is no good" gramatically correct English?

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