rarely

English

Etymology tree

English rare

Proto-Indo-European *leyg-der.

Proto-Germanic *līkąder.

Proto-Germanic *-līkaz

Proto-Germanic *-ê

Proto-Germanic *-līkê

Proto-West Germanic *-līkē

Old English -līċe

Middle English -ly

English -ly

English rarely

From rare + -ly.

enPR: râr'li
(UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɹɛːli/
(US) IPA^(key): /ˈɹɛəɹli/
- Audio (US): (file)
(MLE) IPA^(key): /ɹɛli/
(New Zealand)
- IPA^(key): /ɹeə.liː/
  - Homophone: really
- IPA^(key): /ɹeəɹliː/ (to distinguish from really)
(Indic) IPA^(key): /ˈrɛjə(r)li/, /ˈra(r)li/, (rhotic) /rerli/
- (for some non-rhotic speakers) Homophone: rally
Hyphenation: rare‧ly
Rhymes: (UK) -ɛːli, (US) -ɛəɹli

rarely (comparative rarelier or more rarely, superlative rareliest or most rarely)

Not occurring at a regular interval; seldom; not often. [from 16th c.]
Synonyms: see Thesaurus:rarely

We rarely go to the theatre.

Rarely do you ever find an eagle this far up the river.
- 2019 December 31, AJ Willingham, “All the trends we loved and hated in the 2010s”, in CNN‎^[1]:
  You have to give them credit, rarely does a character appeal equally to four-year-old children and middle-aged aunts posting tepid jokes and fake Oscar Wilde quotes on their timelines.
Unusually well; excellently. [from 16th c.]
After all the schooling, I can finally write rarely now.
To a rare degree; very. [from 16th c.]
I became a rarely good judge of the best in modern painting.
- 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 32, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:
  others speake very honourably of his life and death, and in all other circumstances declare him to have beene a most excellent and rarely virtuous man.

It is grammatically a negative word. It therefore collocates with ever rather than never.

Compare We rarely ever go to the theatre. with We almost never go to the theatre.

not occurring at a regular interval — see also infrequently,‎ seldom

Arabic: قَلِيلًا (qalīlan), قَلِيلًا مَا (qalīlan mā), قَلَّمَا (qallamā), نَادِرًا (nādiran)
Moroccan Arabic: قليل (qlīl)
Armenian: հազվադեպ (hy) (hazvadep)
Azerbaijani: gec-gec
Bulgarian: рядко (bg) (rjadko)
Catalan: rarament (ca)
Chinese:
Mandarin: 很少 (hěnshǎo), 罕有地 (zh) (hǎnyǒu de)
Czech: zřídka (cs)
Danish: sjældent
Dutch: zelden (nl)
Esperanto: malofte
Faroese: sjáldan
Finnish: harvoin (fi)
French: rarement (fr)
German: selten (de)
Greek:
Ancient Greek: σπανίως (spaníōs)
Hungarian: ritkán (hu)
Icelandic: sjaldan (is)
Ido: rare (io)
Ingrian: harvaa, harvoin
Italian: raramente (it)
Japanese: 滅多に…ない (ja) (mettani … nai), 稀に (ja) (mare ni)
Latin: rārē
Latvian: reti
Lithuanian: retai (lt)
Macedonian: ретко (retko)
Norwegian:
Bokmål: sjelden (no)

Nynorsk: sjeldan
Ojibwe: wiikaa
Polish: rzadko (pl)
Portuguese: raramente (pt)
Romanian: rar (ro), rareori (ro)
Russian: ре́дко (ru) (rédko), нечасто (ru) (nečasto), изредка (ru) (izredka)
Serbo-Croatian: rijetko (sh)
Slovene: rédko (sl)
Spanish: rara vez, raramente (es)
Swedish: ovanligen, sällan (sv)
Ukrainian: рі́дко (rídko), зрі́дка (zrídka), і́нколи (uk) (ínkoly), неча́сто (nečásto)
Uzbek: kamdan-kam (uz)
Volapük: selediko, plödakösömiko
Walloon: rålmint (wa)

unusually well

to a rare degree