unless.
Except on a specified condition; if not.
Meaning & usage
Except on a specified condition; if not.
I’m leaving unless I get a pay rise.
You can't go out unless it stops raining.
If not; used with counterfactual conditionals.
Except if; used with hypothetical conditionals.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English unlesse, earlier on lesse (modern on + less), from (not) on lesse (than) (“(not) on a less compelling condition (than)”). The quality of negation in the word and the lack of stress changed on to un-.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.