Word.ws English Dictionary

just as well

just as well adverb: used to say that an occurrence, or situation, is not only fortunate, but that on the contrary, it could have been a lot worse; or that something that might at first seem bad is actually good because it could have been worse.

Adverb

just as well (not comparable)

  1. Used to say that an occurrence, or situation, is not only fortunate, but that on the contrary, it could have been a lot worse; or that something that might at first seem bad is actually good because it could have been worse.
    • It's just as well you missed the train: it ended up crashing.
    • Nothing is produced at Sellafield any more. Which was just as well, because I’d gone to Sellafield not to observe how it lived but to understand how it is preparing for its end.December 15 2022, Samanth Subramanian, “Dismantling Sellafield: the epic task of shutting down a nuclear site”, in The Guardian
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see just, as well, as, well.
    • A paper cup will do (us) just as well.

Questions about just as well

What does just as well mean?
Just as well means used to say that an occurrence, or situation, is not only fortunate, but that on the contrary, it could have been a lot worse; or that something that might at first seem bad is actually good because it could have been worse.
What part of speech is just as well?
Just as well is an adverb.

Words near just as well in the dictionary

  1. just a sec
  2. just a second
  3. just about
  4. just another pretty face
  5. just as soon as
  6. just as well
  7. just assume
  8. just because
  9. just because there's a goalie, doesn't mean you can't score
  10. just cause
  11. just causes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: just as well (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.

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