what in the world in English

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{
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "what in the world",
      "name": "en-interj"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "intj",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Entries with translation boxes",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Terms with Indonesian translations",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Terms with Norwegian Bokmål translations",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Terms with Norwegian Nynorsk translations",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Terms with Swedish translations",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              1,
              18
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1875, Catholic World, volume 21, page 201:",
          "text": "\"What in the world are you talking about, Roger?\" asked my father in amazement.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "An exclamation of surprise."
      ],
      "id": "en-what_in_the_world-en-intj-3o-iLYuU",
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "in what world"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "what on Earth"
        }
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "id",
          "lang": "Indonesian",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "apa-apaan"
        },
        {
          "code": "nb",
          "lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "hva i all verden?"
        },
        {
          "code": "nn",
          "lang": "Norwegian Nynorsk",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "kva i all verda?"
        },
        {
          "code": "sv",
          "lang": "Swedish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "vad i hela världen"
        },
        {
          "code": "sv",
          "lang": "Swedish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "vad i all världen"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "what in the world"
}

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{
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "what in the world",
      "name": "en-interj"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "intj",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "in what world"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English interjections",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "Entries with translation boxes",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries",
        "Terms with Indonesian translations",
        "Terms with Norwegian Bokmål translations",
        "Terms with Norwegian Nynorsk translations",
        "Terms with Swedish translations",
        "Translation table header lacks gloss"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              1,
              18
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1875, Catholic World, volume 21, page 201:",
          "text": "\"What in the world are you talking about, Roger?\" asked my father in amazement.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "An exclamation of surprise."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "what on Earth"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "id",
      "lang": "Indonesian",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "apa-apaan"
    },
    {
      "code": "nb",
      "lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "hva i all verden?"
    },
    {
      "code": "nn",
      "lang": "Norwegian Nynorsk",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "kva i all verda?"
    },
    {
      "code": "sv",
      "lang": "Swedish",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "vad i hela världen"
    },
    {
      "code": "sv",
      "lang": "Swedish",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "vad i all världen"
    }
  ],
  "word": "what in the world"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-08-12 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-08-02 using wiktextract (7cef23e and 3c020d2). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.

"what in the world" meaning in English

Interjection