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kindly

adjective · adverb

Simple meaning

Having a kind personality.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

kyndlee

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈkaɪndli

This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

adjective

  1. Having a kind personality; kind, warmhearted, sympathetic.

adverb

  1. In a kind manner or out of kindness

  2. In a favourable way.

  3. Used to make a polite request: please.

  4. us

    With kind acceptance; used with take.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
Frequency
Moderately Common
Typical Use
Neutral / general English

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More ways to use kindly

  • “He spoke kindly to the boy.”adverb

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

kindly sentkindly feelingkindly given

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Inflected forms

Grammatical variations of the same word.

  • kindnounBase word

    A category of things distinguished by some common characteristic or quality.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • kindnessnounDerived noun

    The quality of being warmhearted and considerate and humane and sympathetic.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: having a kind personality

Antonyms

adjective

Sense: having a kind personality

unkindlyArchaic

adverb

Sense: in a kind manner or out of kindness

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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.