Especially

//ɪˈspɛʃ.(ə.)li// adv

adv ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Adverb
  1. 1
    In a special manner; specially.

    "He got up early especially."

  2. 2
    Particularly; to a greater extent than is normal. focus

    "There is now such an immense "microliterature" on hepatics that, beyond a certain point I have given up trying to integrate (and evaluate) every minor paper published—especially narrowly floristic papers."

  3. 3
    Used to place greater emphasis upon someone or something. focus

    "Invite them all, especially Molly."

Adverb
  1. 1
    to a distinctly greater extent or degree than is common wordnet
  2. 2
    in a special manner wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
in particularparticularlyspeciallya fortioriabove allabove all

Example

More examples

"Even now, many years after the Cold War, there is still much rancor between the Russians and the Germans, especially in areas once occupied by the Soviet Union."

Etymology

From especial + -ly.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.