terribly

adverb

ter·​ri·​bly ˈter-ə-blē 

ˈte-rə-

1

: to an extreme degree : very, extremely

became terribly ill

had a terribly nice time

got terribly excited

I had tried a little radio before the war and hadn't been terribly impressed with it at the time.

—Walter Cronkite

He and Jimmy got into a quarrel about the girl's being fired, and it got terribly bitter.

—Virginia Foster Durr

2

: in a terrible way : very badly, poorly, or unpleasantly

behaving terribly

They were treated terribly.

This can be regarded as a somewhat progressive attitude because it is true that women were terribly abused in the Roman world.

—Norman F. Cantor

And then the next year I played terribly and finished close to last.

—Gene Littler

3

: very much

I miss you terribly.

Synonyms of terribly

• extremely
• very
• incredibly
• too
• highly
• badly
• so
• damned
• damn
• severely
• really
• desperately
• seriously
• far
• intensely
• greatly

Examples of terribly in a Sentence

I'm terribly sorry to bother you

Recent Examples on the Web

This is not at all to suggest Tove Lo has become terribly sensible, though. — Anna Cafolla, Vogue, 18 Sep. 2026

Though Lock and Fleury aren’t Darnold and Kubiak, Wednesday night’s game demonstrated that Seattle is not interested in making terribly many overarching changes from last year’s general offensive approach. — Andrew Destin, New York Times, 11 Sep. 2026

The other might be the terribly limited prospects of people like Miguelito living in Chivilcoy, a town outside Buenos Aires, where the two latter parts of the film is set. — Roberto Prieto, Variety, 11 Sep. 2026

Among the British elites who came of age in the second half of the nineteenth century, less than half listed any recreations at all, perhaps showing that leisure activities weren’t a terribly important part of self-presentation for this group. — Livia Gershon, JSTOR Daily, 8 Sep. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for terribly

• unbearably