whatever

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ʍɒtˈɛvə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /wʌtˈɛvɚ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛvə(r)

whatever

1. No matter what; for any

   Whatever choice you make, there will be consequences.

2. (relative) Anything that.

   Whatever reasons you have for doing this are unimportant to me.

   • 1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, New York, N.Y.: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, page viii:

     Whatever utility the work may have outside of its stated boundaries will be largely because of such a nonprovincial approach.

• whateverism
• whateverness
• whatsoever

• whatever creams your twinkie
• whatever floats your boat
• whatever it takes

whatever

1. No matter what; for any

   Whatever he does, he will still lose the game.

2. (relative) Anything; sometimes used to indicate that the speaker does not care about options.

   I'll do whatever I can.

   • 1734, Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man:

     And, spite of pride, in erring reason's spite, One truth is clear, whatever is, is right.

   • 2013 September-October, Henry Petroski, “The Evolution of Eyeglasses”, in American Scientist:

     The ability of a segment of a glass sphere to magnify whatever is placed before it was known around the year 1000, when the spherical segment was called a reading stone, essentially what today we might term a frameless magnifying glass or plain glass paperweight.

whatever

1. (colloquial, dismissive) A holophrastic expression used discourteously to indicate that the speaker does not consider the matter worthy of further discussion.

   For the last time, brush your teeth! – Whatever!

• Tone of voice is particularly important here in playing up or playing down the dismissive quality of the word.

• so what
• whoopee do
• meh
• whatev

whatever (comparative more whatever, superlative most whatever)

1. (colloquial) Unexceptional or unimportant; blah.
   • 1996, Mathias, “Lake Placid Comments”, in rec.music.phish, Usenet:

     All in all, I guess I shouldn't be complaining, but the rest of the show, imho, was very whatever-ish.

   • 2007, Avril Lavigne (lyrics and music), “Girlfriend”, in The Best Damn Thing:

     She's like so whatever / You can do so much better

2. (dated, postpositive) At all, absolutely, whatsoever.

   There is no point whatever in going on with this discussion.

   • 1910, Emerson Hough, chapter I, in The Purchase Price: Or The Cause of Compromise, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, OCLC 639762314, page 0045:

     Serene, smiling, enigmatic, she faced him with no fear whatever showing in her dark eyes. The clear light of the bright autumn morning had no terrors for youth and health like hers.

• everwhat