accidentally

adverb

ac·ci·dent·al·ly ˌak-sə-ˈdent-lē

-ˈden-tᵊl-ē

Synonyms of accidentally next

: in an accidental or unintended manner : by accident

I accidentally deleted the file.

The lock prevents the gate from opening accidentally.

Six lionfish were accidentally released from a home aquarium in Biscayne Bay, Fla., during Hurricane Andrew in 1992.—

Alcestis Cooky Oberg

The Olympic test was thrown out after the test lab accidentally destroyed the backup sample … that's required to confirm a positive result.—

Christie Aschwanden

He bumped into her accidentally on purpose. [=he bumped into her intentionally but he tried to make it appear to be an accident]

Examples of accidentally in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Also, does Smitty realize that accidentally bumping into someone would have cracked one of the deadly vials taped to her stomach? —

Vlada Gelman, TVLine, 7 Feb. 2025 The soon-to-be bride and groom are still confused on whether or not they accidentally got married. —

Ashlyn Robinette, People.com, 7 Feb. 2025 Glimpse at a study taken offline A technical glitch resulted in a table from one of the bird flu studies accidentally being published on Thursday, before officials scrambled to take it down. —

Alexander Tin, CBS News, 7 Feb. 2025 Jeff Daniels recently reflected on filming Dumb and Dumber with Jim Carrey, who played Lloyd in the comedy, and zeroed in on one of the most memorable scenes: the sequence in which his empty-headed Harry Dunne fights for his life on the toilet after accidentally drinking a whole lotta laxatives. —

Wesley Stenzel, EW.com, 7 Feb. 2025 See all Example Sentences for accidentally