Dictionary Entry
overly
Part of SpeechadjectivePronunciation/oh-ver-lee/Superficial; not thorough; careless, negligent, inattentive.
In a Sentence
“She was overly confident about the test, assuming she would get an A without studying.”
Origin
From Middle English, formed from over + -ly meaning ‘to an excessive degree’.
Common Phrases
concerned overlyoptimistic overlysensitive overlysimplistic overlyaggressive overlyambitious overly
Synonyms
Antonyms
Poetry examples for “overly”
Excerpts from the ReadingWillow English Library collection.
Poetry examples are still being gathered for this entry. They will appear here once matching poems are available in the library.
