adv ·3 syllables ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Adverb

1. 1
   In a modest manner; with humility.

   "The man bowed modestly and left the dinner table."

2. 2
   To a small degree.

   "These new shuttlelike craft might modestly reduce the cost of getting to low earth orbit."

Adverb

1. 1
   with modesty; in a modest manner wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

a bita littlea little bita mitea smidgena smidgeon

Antonyms

All antonyms

immorallyunchastelyimmodestly

Example

More examples

"She listened to him with her eyes modestly cast down."

Etymology

From modest + -ly.

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