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.
Some have played out as expected while others have taken unanticipated paths.
From Barron's • Apr. 15, 2026
“In-home care is the most underestimated and unanticipated cost,” says Nina Pflumm Herndon, president of the Aging Life Care Association.
From MarketWatch • Apr. 15, 2026
Health-policy wonks in the Obama administration tucked $30 billion into the 2009 stimulus package to accelerate EHR adoption, a move that had unanticipated consequences.
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 8, 2026
Similarly, with Glasner, while his announcement on Friday was unexpected, the fact he has decided to leave Selhurst Park is far from unanticipated.
From BBC • Jan. 16, 2026
Past voyages of discovery suggest that many of the most interesting inhabitants of the galactic continent remain as yet unknown and unanticipated.
From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan
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.
