Word.ws English Dictionary

at any rate

at any rate prepositional phrase: in any case: anyway, anyhow, regardless; used to discard a previous thought or discount its importance.

Prepositional phrase

  1. (conjunctive) In any case: anyway, anyhow, regardless; used to discard a previous thought or discount its importance.
    • Jim broke the window — or maybe it was John? At any rate, the window’s broken now.
    • He's stinking rich — or, at any rate, pretty well off.
  2. In any case: by any measure, any way one slices it; used to emphasize that a point matters no matter which instance is operative or how one looks at the situation.
    • At any rate, no aircraft can leave this hangar until no fewer than three inspectors have signed off on it.
    • What moved from A to B at such speed was surely myself, or at any rate my soul or mind — the massless center of my being and home of my consciousness.1978, Daniel C. Dennett, “Where Am I?”, in Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays on Mind and Psychology, Bradford Books
  3. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see at, any, rate.
    • Mr Chairman, I'd point out here that taxation without representation is an affront at any rate, low or high, but it is especially galling at the rate that Mr Smith proposes.

at any rate meaning in Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada

at any rate in Tamil

எவ்வாறிப்பினும், எவ்வாறிருப்பினும்

at any rate in Malayalam

anyhow, in any case, anyway
ഏതുവിധത്തിലും, വല്ലമട്ടിലും, ഏതുപ്രകാരത്തിലും, ഏതുകണക്കിനും, ഏതുവിധേനയും, ഏതെങ്കിലും തരത്തിൽ

at any rate in Kannada

ಹೇಗೇ ಆಗಲಿ, ಏನೇ ಆಗಲಿ, ಅಂತೂ

Examples of at any rate in a sentence

  • Most lone wolves had a moll at any rate—women were their ruin—but if the Bat had a moll, not even the grapevine telegraph could locate her.1920, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Avery Hopwood, chapter I, in The Bat: A Novel from the Play (Dell Book; 241), New York, N.Y.: Dell Publishing...
  • At any rate, in my experience, they could run like the wind, but longer and heavier trains slowly but surely became too much for them.1947 July and August, “Notes and News: Caledonian Reminiscences”, in Railway Magazine, page 256:
  • Why couldn't it be the case that there are intelligent things that are unable to carry on a conversation, or, at any rate, unable to carry on a conversation with creatures like us?2008, Graham Oppy, David Dowe, “The Turing Test”, in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

Synonyms of at any rate

Questions about at any rate

What does at any rate mean?
At any rate means in any case: anyway, anyhow, regardless; used to discard a previous thought or discount its importance.
What is at any rate in Tamil?
At any rate in Tamil is எவ்வாறிப்பினும், எவ்வாறிருப்பினும். See At any rate meaning in Tamil.
How do you use at any rate in a sentence?
Most lone wolves had a moll at any rate—women were their ruin—but if the Bat had a moll, not even the grapevine telegraph could locate her.
What part of speech is at any rate?
At any rate is a prepositional phrase.

Words near at any rate in the dictionary

  1. at antipodes
  2. at any cost
  3. at any event
  4. at any given moment
  5. at any hand
  6. at any rate
  7. at any risk
  8. at arm's length
  9. at bank
  10. at bar
  11. at bat

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: at any rate (page history and authors); at any rate (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); at any rate (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); at any rate (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-at any rate.wav.

Cite this entry: “at any rate.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/at_any_rate. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.