American English pronunciation
How to pronounce actually
IPA transcription: ['æk,tʃuəli]
Pronunciation variants: ['æk,tʃuəli]['æktʃli]['ækʃəli]
Hear “actually” pronounced
['ækʃəli]
Quality: 0.99
['æk,tʃuəli]
Quality: 0.98
['ækʃəli]
Quality: 0.98
Adverb
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in actual fact
“to be nominally but not actually independent”
“no one actually saw the shark”
“large meteorites actually come from the asteroid belt”
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used to imply that one would expect the fact to be the opposite of that stated; surprisingly
“you may actually be doing the right thing by walking out”
“she actually spoke Latin”
“they thought they made the rules but in reality they were only puppets”
“people who seem stand-offish are in reality often simply nervous”
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at the present moment
“the transmission screen shows the picture that is actually on the air”
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as a sentence modifier to add slight emphasis
“actually, we all help clear up after a meal”
“actually, I haven't seen the film”
“I'm not all that surprised actually”
“she hasn't proved to be too satisfactory, actually”
Usage examples
- Indeed, in Bollywood music, the designation is actually music director.
- If we actually do want it solved, it will be.
- That’s interesting, I’m actually an animal rights campaigner.
- Eriko finds out that the mastermind behind Illbleed, Michael Reynolds, is actually her father.
- This was complicated by the fact he did not actually own this property.
- I'm actually planning to try and build a robotics platform around one of those phones.
- The yellow brick road is actually quite long.
- Alison realizes what actually happened that night, and they kiss.
- Sorry, I'll explain more when I actually understand what's going on.
- Would you believe he actually asked me out?