by the way
by the way prepositional phrase: incidentally; used in referencing a parenthetical statement not timely, central, or crucial to the topic at hand; foregone, passed by, something that has already happened.
Prepositional phrase
- Incidentally; used in referencing a parenthetical statement not timely, central, or crucial to the topic at hand; foregone, passed by, something that has already happened.
- His mother will be coming for dinner tomorrow, and, by the way, she recently sold her collection of ceramic eggs.
- […] I had counted on a life-lease of the profits, whereas I only received those of a few short years. But this is by the way.1853, Herman Melville, “Bartleby, the Scrivener”, in The Piazza Tales, New York: Dix, Edwards & Co, published 1856
- Synonyms:
- apropos, BTW, by the by, incidentally
by the way meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Bengali and Telugu
by the way in Hindi
- incidentally
- वैसे vaise
by the way in Urdu
- incidentally
- ویسے vaise
by the way in Bengali
- by the way
- বত্ব botto
by the way in Telugu
- incidentally
- అన్నట్టు annaṭṭu
More languagesFewer languages
- by the way in Malayalam
- സംഭവഗത്യാ, ആനുഷംഗികമായി, പ്രസംഗവശാൽ, പ്രസംഗേന
- by the way in Punjabi
- ਉਂਞ ūñj
- by the way in Arabic
- بِالْمُنَاسَبَةِ bi-l-munāsaba, عَلَى فِكْرَةٍ ʕalā fikratin
- by the way in Indonesian
- ngomong ngomong
- by the way in Persian
- راستی râsti
- by the way in Vietnamese
- nhân đây, à này, tiện thể
Synonyms of by the way
Forms of by the way
| alternative form | BTW |
|---|---|
| alternative form | btw |
Origin of by the way
First appeared in the 10th century with literal meaning "by the side of the road", from Old English weġ (which became "way") meaning "road". Soon afterward (circa 1000) it came to mean "during one's journey". The figurative meaning developed in the mid-16th century, with the first instance of the modern meaning being from 1614.
Questions about by the way
- What does by the way mean?
- By the way means incidentally; used in referencing a parenthetical statement not timely, central, or crucial to the topic at hand; foregone, passed by, something that has already happened.
- What is by the way in Hindi?
- By the way in Hindi is वैसे (vaise). See By the way meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is by the way?
- By the way is a prepositional phrase.
Words near by the way in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: by the way (page history and authors); বত্ব (Bengali) (page history and authors); by the way (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); ਉਂਞ (Punjabi) (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: en-au-by the way.ogg.
Cite this entry: “by the way.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/by_the_way. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.