Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adverb For a moment or an instant.
  • adverb Usage Problem In a moment; very soon.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • So as to be momentary; for a moment.
  • From moment to moment: as, he is momentarily expected.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adverb Every moment; from moment to moment.
  • adverb In a moment; in the immediate future.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adverb In a momentary manner; for a moment or instant.
  • adverb US In a moment or very soon; at any moment.
  • adverb Progressively; moment-by-moment.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adverb for an instant or moment
  • adverb at any moment

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From momentary + -ly.

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Examples

  • His expression momentarily froze, so she breezed past the moment by asking, “You must remember a lot about the missions of these ships.”

    Star Trek The Next Generation® David A. McIntee 2011

  • His expression momentarily froze, so she breezed past the moment by asking, “You must remember a lot about the missions of these ships.”

    Star Trek The Next Generation® David A. McIntee 2011

  • The name momentarily stuck in her throat as Luz attempted to be more magnanimous.

    The Glory Game Janet Dailey 1985

  • The name momentarily stuck in her throat as Luz attempted to be more magnanimous.

    The Glory Game Janet Dailey 1985

  • The name momentarily stuck in her throat as Luz attempted to be more magnanimous.

    The Glory Game Janet Dailey 1985

  •  She had forgotten his name momentarily, too, and the priest had to repeat it for her.

    Shuffling Deck Chairs on the Titanic 2009

  • She had forgotten his name momentarily, too, and the priest had to repeat it for her.

    Shuffling Deck Chairs on the Titanic Sharon Hunt 2009

  • Logs in momentarily, but them jumps back to the login screen

    EXTRALIFE – By Scott Johnson - ExtraLife FINALLY has a chat board 2006

  • That being said, if bias can be divorced momentarily from the partisanship engineered by K Street: what do you think on the fact that for the first time in history the House leadership is coming from a city on the Pacific?

    Sound Politics: What It Means 2006

  • About there or a little north all the channels started coming back in strong but would disappear momentarily is I went under an underpass.

    XM RADIO IN CENTRAL MEXICO 2006

Comments

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  • There is a whole bit on Sports Night about this word.

    June 30, 2007

  • Constantly misused.

    November 11, 2008