unlikely
/ʌnˈlaɪkli/
unlikely adjective: not likely; improbable; not to be reasonably expected.
Adjective
unlikely (comparative unlikelier or more unlikely, superlative unlikeliest or most unlikely)
- Not likely; improbable; not to be reasonably expected.
- It is pretty unlikely that you'll win, but I will pray that at least you do well.
- In the highly unlikely event of landing in water, lifejackets are stored under the seat.
- Not holding out a prospect of success; likely to fail; unpromising.
- unlikely means
Adverb
unlikely (comparative more unlikely, superlative most unlikely)
- In an improbable manner.
Noun
unlikely (plural unlikelies)
- Something or somebody considered unlikely.
- The molecular ion candidates are divided by the testing phase into three categories: rejects, unlikelies, and probables. Differences between each candidate and the prominent peaks in the spectrum are computed.1980, Robert K. Lindsay, Applications of artificial intelligence for organic chemistry
- "Here is my every possible phone number, plus a few unlikelies. And I've also put down the numbers of Karin and Wade, in case you've lost them. Karin can come anytime; Wade, up until six in the morning."1996, Laurie R. King, To Play the Fool
unlikely meaning in Marathi, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
unlikely in Marathi
- unlikely
- असंभव asambhav
unlikely in Urdu
- انہونی
unlikely in Bengali
- unlikely or usual incident
- অঘটন ôghôṭôn
- unlikely, improbable
- অঘটনীয় ôghôṭôniẏô
unlikely in Malayalam
- doubtful, dubious improbable
- ഉണ്ടാവാനിടയില്ലാത്ത, സാദ്ധ്യതയില്ലാത്ത, അസംഭവ്യം, സംയശകരം, സന്ദേഹാത്മകം, ശങ്കനീയം
- improbable, implausible, questionable
- അസംഭവ്യം, ന്യായമായി തോന്നാത്ത, സംഭാവ്യമല്ലാത്ത, സത്യമാകാൻ സാദ്ധ്യതയില്ലാത്ത, ചോദ്യം ചെയ്യത്തക്ക, സന്ദേഹാസ്പദമായ
More languagesFewer languages
- unlikely in Kannada
- ಅಸಂಭವನೀಯ, ಸಂಭವಿಸುವ ಭರವಸೆಯಿಲ್ಲದ
- unlikely in Arabic
- مِنْ غَيْرِ المُرَجَّحِ min ḡayri l-murajjaḥi
Examples of unlikely in a sentence
- Yet oddly enough I found here a far more unlikely substance, and that was camphor.1895 May 29, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter X, in The Time Machine: An Invention, London: William Heinemann, →OCLC:
- Saturday’s tariffs are unlikely to be Trump’s last.2025 February 1, Kevin Liptak, “With stiff tariffs he promised now in place, Trump opens a new trade war”, in CNN:
- Then the most unlikely of unlikelies happened.2001, Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Marci Shimoff, Chicken soup for the mother's soul 2, page 166:
Forms of unlikely
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | unlikelier |
| comparative | more unlikely |
| superlative | unlikeliest |
| superlative | most unlikely |
| Adverb | |
| comparative | more unlikely |
| superlative | most unlikely |
| Noun | |
| plural | unlikelies |
Origin of unlikely
From Middle English unlykely, unlikly, unlykly, unlicli. By surface analysis, un- + likely.
Words formed from unlikely
Questions about unlikely
- What does unlikely mean?
- Unlikely means not likely; improbable; not to be reasonably expected.
- What is unlikely in Marathi?
- Unlikely in Marathi is असंभव (asambhav). See Unlikely meaning in Marathi.
- How do you use unlikely in a sentence?
- Yet oddly enough I found here a far more unlikely substance, and that was camphor.
- What part of speech is unlikely?
- Unlikely can be an adjective, an adverb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce unlikely?
- Unlikely is pronounced /ʌnˈlaɪkli/.
Words near unlikely in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: unlikely (page history and authors); असंभव (Marathi) (page history and authors); unlikely (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); অঘটন (Bengali) (page history and authors); unlikely (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); unlikely (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: en-us-unlikely.ogg, en-GB-unlikely.ogg.
Cite this entry: “unlikely.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/unlikely. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.