lately

American  

[layt-lee] / ˈleɪt li /

adverb

1. of late; recently; not long since.

   He has been very grouchy lately.

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lately British  

/ ˈleɪtlɪ /

adverb

1. in recent times; of late

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Etymology

Origin of lately

before 1000; Middle English latli; Old English lætlīce; see late, -ly

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Explanation

Something that happened lately occurred very recently. If you've spotted a fox every day for the last week, you might say, "I've seen so many foxes lately!" If your friend says, "I've been really stressed out lately," she means she's been overworked and tense for the past few days, weeks, or possibly months. Lately is an adverb that covers the immediate past, a period of time that wasn't too long ago. A more old-fashioned way to say lately is "of late." Though this word has had its current meaning since the fifteenth century, it originally meant "slow or sluggish."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

lately

Cloud-computing growth and Google’s AI chips, which Anthropic is spending billions of dollars on, have been driving its earnings lately.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2026

Operationally, Tesla hasn’t been doing spectacularly well lately.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 27, 2026

There are large outbreaks in Texas and South Carolina, but Pennsylvania has been hit especially hard lately, with over 1,300 cases and 250 hospitalizations reported this year so far.

From Salon ● Oct. 24, 2026

But lately, those familiar elements of Eze have been missing.

From BBC ● Oct. 21, 2026

At every corner they’d turned lately, there’d been only one direction open ahead of them.

From "The School for Whatnots" by Margaret Peterson Haddix

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