Gradually

How to spell gradually

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce gradually

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does gradually mean?

1. adverbIn a slow, steady way that happens by small steps over time.

Gradually in a sentence

• The new manager gradually won the trust of the whole team.

• Interest rates rose gradually over the course of the year.

Where does gradually come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin noun gradus, which literally meant 'a step' or 'a pace', and by extension a stage or degree in a sequence. From this the medieval Latin adjective gradualis was formed, describing something that proceeds 'by steps' rather than all at once. English took up 'gradual' in the fifteenth century, and the adverb 'gradually' followed as writers added the familiar -ly ending to describe an action unfolding step by step. The same gradus root sits inside a whole family of everyday words, including 'grade', 'degree', 'gradient' and even 'graduate', all of which carry the idea of stages or steps. The spelling trap lives in the middle: the unstressed '-ua-' sequence is easy to slur in speech, so writers sometimes drop a letter or write 'gradualy' with a single l, when the word in fact keeps both the -al of 'gradual' and the -ly of the adverb.

How the word is built

• grad (from Latin gradus: step, degree)
• -ual (adjective suffix)
• -ly (adverb suffix)