jolly well

adverb

Certainly, very well.

“You jolly well deserved it.”

Meanings

adverbjolly well (not comparable)
  1. UKdatedemphatichumorousnot comparablesometimesCertainly, very well.

    You jolly well deserved it.

    4 more examples

    We never had a Christmas in the country before. It was simply ripping. And […] we had games and charades, and hide-and-seek, and Devil in the Dark, which is a game girls pretend to like, and very few do really, and crackers and a Christmas-tree for the village children, and everything you can jolly well think of.

    1904, E[dith] Nesbit, “(please specify the page)”, in New Treasure Seekers, London: Ernest Benn, →OCLC

    "Oh, I shall pull it off. I shall jolly well have to succeed," said Michael light-heartedly; feeling unusually confident.

    1920, Eric Leadbitter, Rain Before Seven, page 122

    Adrian thought it worth while trying out his new slang. […] ‘That’s beastly talk, Thompson. Jolly well take it back or expect a good scragging.’

    1991 September, Stephen Fry, chapter 1, in The Liar, London: Heinemann, →ISBN, section III, page 26

    For most main lines, that's one or two extra trains every hour. "We jolly well ought to be able to encompass that on a lot of lines," he suggests.

    2022 April 6, Philip Haigh, “Passenger numbers increase... and freight must follow”, in RAIL, number 954, page 51
Cite this entry
APA

jolly well. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/jolly%20well

MLA

“jolly well.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/jolly%20well. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “jolly well,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/jolly%20well.

Source: jolly well on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.