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tensely

adverb

Simple meaning

With worry or with muscles tightened up.

Pronunciation

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tehnslee

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈtɛnsli

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.

adverb

  1. In a tense manner

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
C2 · Proficient (estimated)

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More ways to use tensely

  • “He sat down tensely.”adverb

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Common Patterns and Combinations

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forward tenselytensely alerttensely dramatic

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Inflected forms

Grammatical variations of the same word.

  • tensenounBase word

    A grammatical category of verbs used to express distinctions of time.

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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.