Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adverb In a hopeful manner.
  • adverb Usage Problem It is to be hoped.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • In a hopeful or encouraging manner; in a manner to excite hope; with ground for expectation of advantage, success, or pleasure.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adverb In a hopeful manner.
  • adverb I hope; if all goes well.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adverb It is hoped that; I hope; we hope.
  • adverb In a hopeful manner.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adverb it is hoped
  • adverb with hope; in a hopeful manner

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Coined between 1630 and 1640 from hopeful +‎ -ly.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word hopefully.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • This means "with hope" -- not "I hope."

    December 28, 2006

  • Someone's got this on a "meanings have changed over the years" list, and I would rather agree. I think it got co-opted because people did want a single word to mean "I hope that".

    October 30, 2007

  • Hopefully, I'll now start using this word less....

    October 31, 2007

  • I admit to being uncomfortable with this. The usual technical arguments aside, I find it unpleasingly vague in most cases, or at worst a meaningless filler.

    February 3, 2009

  • I use it in the same contexts that I use "hoffentlich" in German. I think it (the relevant form) works in both languages.

    February 3, 2009