Other forms: expected, expecting, expects
To expect something is to believe it is going to happen. I expect she will be late. We are expecting rain. It is a prediction, not a hope — which is the difference from hope, and the one that matters.
There are three more uses worth having. To expect somebody is to be waiting for them to arrive: we are expecting visitors. To expect something of somebody is to require it: I expect an answer by Friday, which is close to demand. And expecting on its own is a mild way of saying pregnant. Watch the grammar: expect to do, expect somebody to do, expect that — all fine — but never expect somebody doing.
1verbexpectTo think that something will happen.~84%
“I expect it will rain before lunch.”
synonyms: anticipate, reckon
2verbwaitingTo be waiting for somebody or something to arrive.~2%
“We are expecting a delivery this afternoon.”
3verbrequireTo require something of somebody.~12%
“The school expects pupils to be on time.”
4verbpregnantTo be pregnant.~2%
“She is expecting in March.”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 9 sentences found in the wild and placed 8 of them on a sense (1 were unclear) — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
expect is a way of thinking ahead.
Latin exspectare is ex-, out, plus spectare, to look — so to expect is to look out for something. The same spectare gives spectator, inspect and spectacle. The modern sense has stopped being about the eyes, but the posture is the same: facing the direction the thing will come from.
Proto-Indo-European
*speḱ-
Latin
expectāre
English, today
expect
Built from
From Latin expectāre, infinitive form of exspectō (“look out for, await, expect”), from ex (“out”) + spectō (“look at”), frequentative of speciō (“see”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA