radically
Americanadjective
-
with regard to origin or root.
-
in a complete or basic manner; thoroughly; fundamentally.
adverb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of radically
Explanation
The adverb radically is a great way to say "in an extreme way." When your formerly long-haired friend shows up at work with a crew cut, you could say that she looks radically different. Use radically to describe things that are done in a big way, particularly a change or an extreme position. For example, the government in your state might change radically after an important election. You'll often see the phrase "radically different" used to mean a change that's enormous, possibly even transforming. Though the root of radically, radical, originally meant "root of a word," it came to mean "far-reaching, innovative, or extreme," especially when it describes political views.
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.
Americans "woke up to a radically altered political landscape", the paper says, as a "new era on Capitol Hill dawned".
From BBC ● Nov. 5, 2026
The MIT team decided to explore a radically different possibility.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 4, 2026
“It’s a big, juicy part that works in the hands of radically different people,” Pinkleton said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 3, 2026
In Mr. Specht’s telling, the great 19th-century concept of “landed democracy” provided “a vision of a radically egalitarian country made possible by widely diffused landownership.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 30, 2026
And one pleasant summer afternoon, deep in the interstices of one of his interminable lectures, he was visited by a revelation that was to alter radically the future of astronomy.
From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan
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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.
