dryly
Britishadverb
Explanation
If you say something dryly, you say it in a funny but matter-of-fact way. Your friend's dryly humorous comments might be your favorite thing about watching soap operas with him. People who joke or remark dryly have a straight-faced delivery, even as they are saying the funniest things. You could also describe a black comedy as being dryly funny, or a character in a book as narrating dryly. The adverb dryly comes from dry, which more commonly means "not wet" than "subtly humorous" — although the humor meaning dates from the early 15th century.
Vocabulary lists containing dryly
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.
Sabalenka's emotions were still raw in an honest post-match news conference which she began by dryly claiming she wanted to quit tennis.
From BBC ● Jun. 3, 2026
“That’s the most exciting laundry I’ve ever done,” a man with a gray beard says dryly, then walks back into everyday life, to the extent that everyday life is possible anymore.
From Slate ● Feb. 11, 2026
"I'm scraping," he chuckled dryly, saying his family has cut back on eating out and going on longer drives.
From Barron's ● Feb. 5, 2026
It is the first of the elegiac collection he dryly titled “Poems of 1912-13,” otherwise known as the Emma Poems and a sublime act of self-recrimination.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 16, 2026
“I have a rough idea,” Nicholson said dryly.
From "Nine Stories" by J. D. Salinger
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.
