How to spell happily

hear ithap·pi·ly/'hæpəli/adverbRules and real life

What it means: In a joyful or cheerful manner.

In a sentence: The dog wagged its tail happily.

The part people get wrong

Watch for double p, and an unstressed vowel that is hard to hear. Often misspelled as hapily or happiley.

Same family: happiness, unhappy, happier, happiest, unhappily. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: Happily comes from the adjective “happy,” which originally meant “lucky” or “fortunate” in Middle English. The -ly ending is an old English suffix that turns adjectives into adverbs, showing the way something is done.

Patterns it uses: The unstressed vowel (schwa)

Try spelling it

You will hear the word and a sentence. Type it and press Enter. Then four more words from the same level, so you know where you stand.

Words like this

definitely · totally · seriously · personally · physically · rapidly · constantly · ultimately

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