nearly

Word family

near·ly /ˈnɪəli $ ˈnɪrli/ S1 W1 adverbadv

1 especially British EnglishBrEALMOST almost, but not quite or not completely 几乎，差不多，将近 SYN almost

It took nearly two hours to get here.

到这里花了将近两小时。

Michelle’s nearly twenty.

米歇尔年近二十。

Is the job nearly finished?

这工作快干完了吗？

Louise is nearly as tall as her mother.

路易丝差不多和她母亲一样高。

I nearly always go home for lunch.

我几乎总是回家吃午饭。

He very nearly died.

他差点送命。

► see thesaurus at almost

2 not nearly not at all 远非，绝不是

He’s not nearly as good-looking as his brother.

他长相远不如他弟弟。

We’ve saved some money, but it’s not nearly enough.

我们存了一点钱，不过还远远不够。

Examples from the Corpus

not nearly• Not the least reason for this, of course, was simply the fact that the hierarchy was not nearly as fully developed.• We saved money, but not nearly as much as expected.• Researchers found that thin people also experienced food cravings, but not nearly as much as those who were overweight.• On the other hand, I found law school boring and not nearly as much fun as college.• Several students get through adequate, but not nearly as theatrical, renditions.• But the writing is not nearly as tight nor as taut as it should be.• His 21 errors were a tad high but not nearly as worrisome as his 127 strikeouts.• But this is not nearly enough.

5 GRAMMAR 语法

Do not use nearly before negative words like ‘no’, ‘nothing’ etc. Instead, use almost , or say hardly any , hardly anything etc. 在否定词no, nothing 等之前不要用nearly，而要用almost，或者可以说hardly any, hardly anything等

I know almost nothing (NOT 不说nearly nothing) about him.

我对他几乎一无所知。

There was hardly any traffic (NOT 不说 nearly no traffic).

几乎没有车辆在行驶。

n GRAMMAR: Comparison

nearly

Don’t use nearly before negative words such as ‘no’ or ‘nothing’. ✗Don’t say:
I know nearly nothing about it. | There was nearly no traffic.

almost

You can use almost with negative words such as ‘no’ or ‘nothing’:

I know almost nothing about it.

There was almost no traffic.

hardly

You can also form negative sentences using hardly with ‘any’, ‘anything’ etc:

I know hardly anything about it.

There was hardly any traffic.

Examples from the Corpus

nearly• Oh, my goodness, it's nearly 12:30.• The trouble is that anything you do, nomatterwhat, will nearly always increase the muscular tension and make the situation worse.• He was nearly at the feeding-ground now.• I nearly died from salmonella poisoning.• Porter Payne would drop by nearly every day to see how things were going.• The blizzard also nearly froze secondary trading, participants said.• He was wearing pale blue brushed denim pants and a pale blue shirt that made his blue eyes look nearly luminous.• Last summer nearly saw the second ascent of Ken's Fisherman's Tale by a visiting climber.• He's nearly six feet tall.• Alas, it was not nearly so simple, and many more complex problems remained to be solved.

nearly always• A Yes, my child usually gets her own way - not always, but nearly always.• Her eyes are closed, as these days they nearly always are.• Cocaine production requires large amounts of water, hence factories are nearly always built by streams.• The spasms nearly always cause targets to curl into a foetal position.• We nearly always had milk pudding, rice pudding, semolina or some other stodge.• They dwell instead on invalid core beliefs and the kinds of mythical fear that such beliefs nearly always inspire.• My back hurt, it was hot and sweaty and I was nearly always out of breath.• Then, when they arrive, the suspense is over and delight is nearly always the result.