needn't
USNEED-uhnt/nidn̩t/NEE-duhnt/niːdn̩t/
- 1Used to indicate that something is not necessary or obligatory; the contraction of 'need not'.
You needn't trouble yourself further, as the matter is already settled.
She needn't have apologized, for no one had taken any offense.
Oppositemust
Note
It behaves as a negative modal auxiliary, so the verb that follows is bare, with no to: you needn't worry. Its most telling construction is needn't have plus a past participle, which looks back on something already done that proved pointless, like washing the car just before rain, or the man in V. S. Naipaul's Guerrillas (1975) who needn't have written his book. It is chiefly British and leans formal or literary.
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Origin
A contraction formed from "need" plus the negative ending "-n't."