hastily

Hastily means rashly or too quickly and often carelessly.

The related adjective hasty most commonly means too fast and often careless.

The noun haste most commonly refers to urgency, such as in completing a task. Haste can also be used as another word for speed or swiftness. But haste also commonly means urgency or speed that is careless or reckless. This is how the word is used in the expression haste makes waste, which means that rushing things leads to mistakes. This is how hasty and hastily are most commonly used.

Doing things hastily is thought to lead to mistakes. Making a decision hastily is making it too quickly, often leading to negative consequences.

Hastily can also mean speedily, as in We packed up hastily and left as quickly as we could. 

Example: Don’t make big decisions hastily—you should always take some time to think about them.

The first records of the word hastily come from around 1300. The noun haste is related to the English hæst, “violence,” the Old Norse heifst, “hatred,” the Gothic haifsts, “quarrel,” and the Old High German heisti, “powerful.” The suffix -ly is used to form adverbs (the y in hasty is changed to an i in hastily, which is a spelling convention used in other adverbs whose base adjectives end in y, such as happily).

Hastily is most often used in a negative way. Most of the time, it implies that something was simply done too quickly, leading to mistakes. The opposite of doing something hastily is taking your time.

What are some other forms related to hastily?

• hasty (adjective)
• haste (noun)

What are some synonyms for hastily?

• rashly
• hurriedly
• carelessly
• swiftly
• rapidly
• speedily
• quickly

What are some words that share a root or word element with hastily? 

• make haste
• haste makes waste
• posthaste
• hasten

What are some words that often get used in discussing hastily?

• done
• decision
• too
• hurry
• rush
• careless
• reckless
• mistake

Hastily is most commonly used in a negative way to imply that something has been done too quickly and in a careless way.

We DO need to abolish #fossilfuel subsidies, but it can't be rushed. If done too hastily, policy reforms can backfire, as was the case in Ecuador recently. Our new blog post from @FunkeFranziska and @merriaura outlines what we can learn from this: https://t.co/xJFgAYK1qm

— IISD (@IISD_news) October 25, 2019

In beating the US and EU last week to authorising the #CovidVaccine, Britain kicked off a spirited debate about whether it had moved too hastily or the others were wasting valuable time as the death toll mounted | via @nytimeshttps://t.co/L2wqG1p1hg

— Firstpost (@firstpost) December 9, 2020

Delays with the formal audit of a nuclear reactor raises questions on whether the government is too hastily pushing its green energy platform. #PeninsulaBlog https://t.co/QlLNfp1s0B

— KEI (@KoreaEconInst) December 8, 2020

Which of the following words is NOT a synonym of hastily?

A. rashly
B. carelessly
C. hurriedly
D. calmly