admittedly

English

Etymology

Etymology tree

English admitted

Proto-Indo-European *leyg-

Proto-Germanic *līkąder.

Proto-Germanic *-līkaz

Proto-Germanic *-ê

Proto-Germanic *-līkê

Old English -līċe

Middle English -ly

English -ly

English admittedly

From admitted + -ly.

Pronunciation

• Audio (US):

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Adverb

admittedly (comparative more admittedly, superlative most admittedly)

1. As is acknowledged to be true; by general admission; confessedly.

   Admittedly, vandalism is a bit of a problem.

   She was admittedly the one who killed the baron.

   • 2024 May 6, Ben Guarino, “Defend Yourself against AI Impostor Scams with a Safe Word”, in Scientific American‎^[1]:

     Adopting a computerlike countermeasure for a problem enabled by computer algorithms is admittedly an unnatural practice.

2. (conjunctive) Signals a concession followed by a counterpoint usually headed by but.

   It's only a theory, admittedly, but it might work.

   Admittedly he can't swim, but he still loves going to the seaside anyway.

Synonyms

• granted

Related terms

• admit
• admissibly

Translations

by admission

• Czech: nepochybně (cs)
• French: certes (fr)
• German: zugegebenermaßen (de)
• Greek: ομολογουμένως (el) (omologouménos)
• Hungarian: kétségkívül (hu), kétségtelenül (hu), (followed by a subordinate clause) kétségtelen (hu), nem vitás, el kell ismerni, be kell vallani
• Italian: dichiaratamente (it), innegabilmente (it)
• Polish: co prawda (pl)
• Portuguese: admitidamente
• Russian: по о́бщему призна́нию (po óbščemu priznániju)
• Serbo-Croatian: doduše (sh)
• Spanish: la verdad es que, lo cierto es que, es cierto que, hay que admitir que, admitidamente
• Ukrainian: щопра́вда (ščoprávda)

consession followed by counterpoint

• Dutch: weliswaar (nl)
• German: zwar (de)
• Hungarian: ugyan (hu)
• Icelandic: að vísu
• Swedish: visserligen (sv)

References

• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “admittedly”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “admittedly”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.