supposedly

adverb

sup·​pos·​ed·​ly sə-ˈpō-zəd-lē How to pronounce supposedly (audio)
 also  -ˈpōzd-lē
: as is supposed : according to what is or was said, claimed, or believed by some
a supposedly true story
a supposedly good restaurant
He had dozens of people around him, supposedly looking after him …Philip Norman
Daddy took me to the Legion, to shoot pool supposedly.Mary Karr

Examples of supposedly in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web Regulating what happened on a faraway Irish island—much less regulating what was supposedly happening in purgatory—posed a problem for the church. Lanta Davis and Vince Reighard, Smithsonian Magazine, 15 Mar. 2024 It’s said to have originated in northern China during the Song Dynasty (960 to 1279), when the emperor's favorite concubine supposedly fell sick and a two-week diet of tanghulu healed her. Steffi Cao, Bon Appétit, 15 Mar. 2024 The question is, what would Marie Antoinette, who supposedly introduced the croissant to France (it was then known as the kipferl, an Austrian delicacy), think of its most recent incarnation? Sharon Greenthal, Better Homes & Gardens, 15 Mar. 2024 An algorithm then reads these results and supposedly is able to detect how agitated the worker is. Chloe Berger, Fortune, 15 Mar. 2024 Drive Thor supposedly has 2,000 TOPS of performance, eight times that of Drive Orin. Mark Andrews, WIRED, 13 Mar. 2024 Related Articles Scalia hated the question of what the legislature intended or what its purpose was, supposedly because judges asking those questions would have the opportunity to inject their own views into the meaning of the statute. Noah Feldman, The Mercury News, 9 Mar. 2024 Slater supposedly shared the information with a female claiming to be in Ukraine in early 2022, starting around the time when Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24 of that year. Diba Mohtasham, NPR, 5 Mar. 2024 And researchers have long been puzzled by a medical mystery: Some women susceptible to recurrent UTIs experience symptoms without any signs of bacteria, or after an infection has supposedly been cleared with antibiotics. Theresa Gaffney, STAT, 1 Mar. 2024

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'supposedly.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1597, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of supposedly was in 1597

Dictionary Entries Near supposedly

Cite this Entry

“Supposedly.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/supposedly. Accessed 28 Mar. 2024.

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