From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishnice trynice tryused when someone has made a guess or suggestion, or has attempted to do something, to say that it is good, but not quite correct or successful ‘We could phone Mark to come and pick us up.’ ‘Nice try, Clive, but we haven’t got his number.’ → nice
Examples from the Corpus
nice try• You miscalculated, but it was a nice try.• It was a nice try, a necessary try, but one that ultimately failed. 