for certain

1. 1.

   definitely or positively (`sure' is sometimes used informally for `surely')

   “the results are surely encouraging”

   “she certainly is a hard worker”

   “it's going to be a good day for sure”

   “they are coming, for certain”

   “they thought he had been killed sure enough”

   “he'll win sure as shooting”

   “they sure smell good”

   “sure he'll come”

   Synonymssurelycertainlysurefor suresure enoughsure as shooting

   colloquialism

Questions about for certain

What does for certain mean?

for certain means "definitely or positively (`sure' is sometimes used informally for `surely')".

What is another word for for certain?

Close synonyms include surely, certainly, sure, for sure, sure enough. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is for certain a common word?

for certain is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.