ideally
AmericanEtymology
Origin of ideally
Explanation
Use the adverb ideally to mean "perfectly" or "preferably." Ideally, you would always be ideally positioned to get a clear view of the parade going by — and not stuck behind a tall man in a top hat. You can start a sentence off with this word to convey the idea of "in a perfect world." For example, you might say, "Ideally, I'd be able to sleep in until at least ten every morning." The other way to use it is as a synonym for "perfectly," as in "My cat and I are ideally suited for each other" or "The vanilla ice cream complemented my apple pie."
Vocabulary lists containing ideally
Alice Austen Lived Here
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Popcorn
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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.
Hospitality has always had scaffolding beneath it; ideally, the guest simply doesn’t spend much time looking at it.
From Salon ● Oct. 7, 2026
“We want to avoid those conflicts by better understanding where they go, what resources they need and ideally help Riverside County take care of these populations.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2026
Before the building work started, the general was said to have rolled large boulders found at the summit - and ideally suit for construction - downhill.
From BBC ● Oct. 1, 2026
And, ideally, don’t put any of it on a credit card.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 22, 2026
His daughter, writer Norah Christianson, remembers that he had “the body of a dancer, lithe and wiry and thin, everything in balance,” a physique ideally suited to the pitch and yaw of a horse’s withers.
From "Seabiscuit: An American Legend" by Laura Hillenbrand
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
