adv ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Adverb

1. 1
   In an unexpected manner.

   "Near-synonyms: against expectations, against all odds, surprisingly"

Adverb

1. 1
   without advance planning wordnet
2. 2
   in a way that was not expected wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

abruptlyaccidentallyagainst all oddsagainst expectationsall at onceall of a sudden

Antonyms

All antonyms

expectedlyinevitably

Example

More examples

"Unexpectedly the weather forecast came true yesterday."

Etymology

From unexpected + -ly or un- + expectedly.

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