autonomously

American  

[aw-ton-uh-muhs-lee] / ɔˈtɒn ə məs li /

adverb

1. in a way that is self-governing or free of outside control; independently.

   The ideal candidate will be able to work autonomously and without supervision.

2. with little or no human control or intervention.

   We have developed a service robot that operates autonomously, in concert with a network of devices in its environment.

3. Biology.

   1. as an independent organism.

      Viruses, on the boundary between living and nonliving, cannot autonomously reproduce but require the biochemistry and structure of a host cell.

   2. naturally or spontaneously, without cultivation.

      They organized a work day to get rid of the plants growing wildly, autonomously, and unwantedly all around the building.

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Other Word Forms

• nonautonomously adverb

Etymology

Origin of autonomously

autonomous ( def. ) + -ly

Example Sentences

But because these AI agents can act autonomously on behalf of humans—and continue to work relentlessly on tasks with unexpected or unconventional methods—they pose a lot of risks.

From The Wall Street Journal

The concept centers on three different types of robots that can work together autonomously to explore and map these harsh underground spaces.

From Science Daily

Capgemini Chief Executive Aiman Ezzat last week said that he only found out about the contract recently from public sources; the U.S. division, he said, operates autonomously because of U.S. requirements to protect classified information.

From The Wall Street Journal

The bot acts as a personal assistant, autonomously taking actions without human prompting by accessing files and applications on a user’s computer.

From MarketWatch

Artificial-intelligence companies have promised that 2026 will be the year of agents, or software that can use AI language models to autonomously execute a complex series of tasks from simple instructions.

From Barron's

Related Words

• freely
• individually
• separately