unanticipated
Britishadjective
Explanation
Unanticipated means "unexpected." Finding a candy bar in your lunchbox when your mom usually packs nothing but health food would be an unanticipated delight. Just as pleasure is sweetest when unanticipated, unanticipated pain is a bitter pill. Getting laid off from a job is often unanticipated––and the fact that you're blindsided by it is often the source of most of the pain. You wonder why you didn't see it coming, and worry that other unanticipated disasters lie in wait for you.
Vocabulary lists containing unanticipated
The SAT: Words to Capture Tone, List 5
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The New SAT: Words to Capture Tone
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Flora and Ulysses
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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.
Mr. Barragán studies an unanticipated consequence of this vision: lonely Westerners, underemployed Lagosians and the matchmaking machinery that helps them find one another.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 14, 2026
Some have played out as expected while others have taken unanticipated paths.
From Barron's • Apr. 15, 2026
"Now that we have reported this unanticipated behavior, the work of fully understanding why it happens and how the behavior manifests in other liquids is an important next step," Lima said.
From Science Daily • Mar. 30, 2026
Retirement brings time, and that additional time can trigger unanticipated expenses.
From MarketWatch • Feb. 18, 2026
Through a completely unanticipated event my moral conscience became clear.
From "Double Helix" by James D. Watson
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.
