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barely - Meaning and Examples

Meaning of 'barely' (Webster Dictionary)

1 . Barely [ adv.]
- Without covering; nakedly.
- Without concealment or disguise.
- Merely; only.
- But just; without any excess; with nothing to spare ( of quantity, time, etc.); hence, scarcely; hardly; as, there was barely enough for all; he barely escaped.

Meaning of 'barely' (Princeton's WordNet)

1 . barely [ r]
Meaning (1):
- only a very short time before
Example in sentence:
  • had scarcely rung the bell when the door flew open;
  • we hardly knew them;
  • would have scarce arrived before she would have found some excuse to leave
Meaning (2):
- by a little
Example in sentence:
  • he finished the marathon in just under 3 hours;
  • I only just caught the bus;
  • it was barely 5 a.m.;
  • the batter just missed being hit;
  • the network has barely 5 percent of viewers
Meaning (3):
- almost not
Example in sentence:
  • he hardly ever goes fishing;
  • he was scarce sixteen years old;
  • I can hardly hear what she is saying;
  • she barely seemed to notice him;
  • they scarcely ever used the emergency generator;
  • we were so far back in the theater, we could barely read the subtitles

Nearby Words:

bar bar iron barb barbacan barbacanage barbadian barbadoes barbados barbaic barbara

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