adversely
Americanadverb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of adversely
Explanation
When something affects you adversely, it's harmful or negative. Holding a cinder block will adversely affect your running speed. When you talk about things that are acting adversely, they are harming something or holding it back in some way. Not getting enough sleep will adversely affect your performance in school. Rain will adversely affect an outdoor wedding. Anything that's making things worse instead of better is adversely influencing the situation. Adversely means something close to badly or harmfully. So when you see this word, you know something is going wrong.
Vocabulary lists containing adversely
Florida's B.E.S.T. Common Suffixes: -ly
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167 Vocabulary words from the Supreme Court's DOMA Decision
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Vocabulary from the Seventh Democratic Debate, March 6, 2016
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“Heightened consumer price sensitivity together with a sustained promotional environment adversely impacted our sales mix,” said BellRing CEO Darcy Davenport.
From Barron's • May 5, 2026
“Business and government can do many things to properly incent retraining, income assistance, reskilling, early retirement and relocation for those whose jobs might be adversely impacted by AI.”
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 6, 2026
The IMO council said in its declaration that members "strongly condemned the threats and attacks against vessels and purported closure of the Strait... by Iran, adversely affecting merchant and commercial vessels".
From Barron's • Mar. 19, 2026
“I do think Google’s self-sufficiency should command a premium relative to the others that could be adversely impacted by one cog in the wheel,” Treacy said, referring to Google’s proprietary tensor processing units.
From MarketWatch • Feb. 12, 2026
Not being noticed at all was better than being noticed adversely.
From "East of Eden" by John Steinbeck
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
