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however

adverbconjunctioncommon in dialogue

  • United Kingdom//haʊˈɛvə//
  • Canada//haʊˈɛvɚ//
  • Australia//hæɔˈevə//
  • New Zealand//hæʊˈevə//
  • //hɑˈwɛvə(ɹ)//

Nevertheless; yet, still; in spite of that.

adverb

  1. 1

    Nevertheless; yet, still; in spite of that.

    He told me not to do it. However, I did it anyway. / I did it anyway, however. / I, however, did it anyway.

    She wanted to go; however, she decided against it.

    I didn't argue with him; I still think, however, that he is wrong.

    Thus, when he drew up instructions in lawyer language, he expressed the important words by an initial, a medial, or a final consonant, and made scratches for all the words between; his clerks, however, understood him very well.

  2. 2

    In contrast.

    The conference itself went very well. The party afterwards, however, was a disaster.

    It appears, however, that Korsch took the view that a revolutionary theory must be the 'expression' of a movement, and not an instrument forged outside the movement by leaders or theoreticians.

  3. 3

    Regardless of how; no matter how

    However clear you think you've been, and however many questions you may've answered, there'll always remain some doubts.

    Any rule of thumb, however true (it is), is useless unless you understand its underlying logic.

    However much I study, I never get good grades.

    Elinor, however little concerned in it, joined in their discourse; and Marianne, who had the knack of finding her way in every house to the library, however it might be avoided by the family in general, soon procured herself a book.

  4. 4

    Regardless of how; regardless of the way in which.

    Let me know when you've had your interview, however it goes.

    However we do this, it isn't going to work.

    Elinor, however little concerned in it, joined in their discourse; and Marianne, who had the knack of finding her way in every house to the library, however it might be avoided by the family in general, soon procured herself a book.

    But the real way to build a successful online business is to be better than your rivals at undermining people's control of their own attention. Partly, this is a result of how online advertising has traditionally worked: advertisers pay for clicks, and a click is a click, however it's obtained.

  5. 5

    In any way in which; how.

    She offered to help however she could.

    Wear your hair however you want.

  6. 6

    informalIn any way that one likes or chooses; in a haphazard or spontaneous way.

    I don't care; just do it however.

    Nothing was really planned; things just happened however.

  7. 7

    How ever: an emphatic form of how, used to ask in what manner.

    I thought it was impossible. However were you able to do it?

  8. 8

    obsoleteIn any case, at any rate, at all events.

    Our chief end and highest interest is happiness : And this is happiness to be freed from all (if it may) [or] however from the greatest evils.

Etymology

From Middle English however, how-ever, how-evere; equivalent to how + ever. Compare howsoever.

conjunction

  1. 1

    But, yet, though, although.

    *She wanted to go, however she decided against it.

The neighbouring pagesAlphabetical order follows the rules of the language, not byte values: an accent decides only between two otherwise identical words, and Spanish files Ñ as a letter of its own.

Lexical content from Wiktionary, under CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source entry · Data version 2026-08-23

Rank among the words of the OpenSubtitles 2018 corpus — film and television subtitles, so spoken rather than written usage (CC BY-SA 3.0).