Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Not likely; improbable.
- adj. Not promising; likely to fail.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Such as cannot be reasonably expected; improbable: as, an unlikely event.
- Not holding out a prospect of success or of a desired result; likely to fail; unpromising.
- Not calculated to inspire liking or affection; not likable or lovable.
- In an unlikely manner; with no or little likelihood; improbably.
Wiktionary
- adj. Not likely; improbable; not to be reasonably expected; as, an unlikely event; the thing you mention is very unlikely. Not holding out a prospect of success; likely to fail; unpromising; as, unlikely means.
- adv. In an improbable manner.
- n. Something or somebody considered unlikely.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Not likely; improbable; not to be reasonably expected
- adj. Not holding out a prospect of success; likely to fail; unpromising.
- adj. obsolete Not such as to inspire liking; unattractive; disagreeable.
- adv. In an unlikely manner.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. not likely to be true or to occur or to have occurred
- adj. having a probability too low to inspire belief
- adj. has little chance of being the case or coming about
Etymologies
- un- + likely (Wiktionary)
Examples
“And still: in 2011, the term "unlikely" doesn't quite carry the weight it used to.”
“One thing I hate to hear, and I hate to hear it even more when it comes from strippers themselves, is the term unlikely stripper.”
“Furthermore, "the Enlightenment" was a term unlikely to be applied to a wanted criminal.”
“Our only quibble is her choice of the word "unlikely.”
“With every game, every precision pass and every clever drive to the basket, Lin is raising expectations, altering the Knicks' fate and redefining the word "unlikely.”
“The lack of ideologically charged cases also makes this term unlikely to provide much evidence of the alleged conservative ascendency.”
“So remember when you're feeling very small and insecure, how amazingly unlikely is your birth.”
“The Pompidou Center is the first Paris museum to embark on what authorities call "cultural decentralization" setting up art centers in unlikely areas outside the capital, with its hordes of masterpiece-worshipping tourists and savvy locals.”
“Even more unlikely is that they would be turned away at the border and refused a reissue or update of their permit.”
“- Serendipitous discoveries that spark off brilliant new ideas (often made in unlikely places, such as the pages of a dusty research book or the aisles of a supermarket) - Sharing your stories, characters and ideas with readers; communicating something worthwhile; touching others”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘unlikely’.
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Kingly epithets
Take one of CharlesFerdinand's excellent Merovingians or Goths, add a "the" and one of these descriptors, and presto, a character for your long-planned spoof fantasy novel.
unlikely, chuckleheaded, aloof, lacklustre, slow, murky, neurotic, clichéd, pediculous, dour, bungling, dandy and 23 more...
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Un-word List
untrammelled, untoward, unenthusiastically, unenthusiastic, undaunted, uncanny, unceasing, unbridled, unacknowledged, unacquainted, unadorned, unaffected and 239 more...
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farfetched
farfetched, improbable, long shot, implausible, don't hold your b..., beggar belief, unbelievable, unlikely, inconceivable, pipe dream
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Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
contemplate, container, consumer, consultant, consensus, conscious, conscience, connection, confusion, confront, conflict, confident and 4334 more...
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Mimi
sober, rhetoric, oratory, ergo, venom, diaphragm, Medieval, piety, incognito, ruse, calamity, evidence and 251 more...
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my dictionary
able, abnormally, abroad, absent, abstract, acceptable, acceptance, access, accessible, accession, according to, account and 4551 more...
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Probability
likelihood, chance, odds, possibility, take a risk, unlikely, fantastic, imaginary, unreal, by chance, accidentally, 50% chance of rain and 1 more...
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Words to learn
omit, in all likelihood, unlikely, utterly, every now and then, once in a while, deceptive, show off, reckon, ever since, after all, consequence and 52 more...
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Poetrie: Fishing on the Susquehanna i...
Fishing on the Susquehanna in July
by Billy Collins
I have never been fishing on the Susquehanna
or on any river for that matter
to be perfectly honest.
...springing, wired, hare, whitening, haystacks, blink, unlikely, whip, flat-bottom, bandanna, dense, cloud-ruffled and 15 more...
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Mogeltron
Miscellaneous idiolect that could be used to assemble a Whichbe simulator.
point of skew, character as fate, doubt for doubt, story of my life, cumulative effect, default settings, reasonable, or tr..., take care, relative proportion, is that so, cognitive bias, and whatnot and 41 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for unlikely.
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