In a way that shows bad judgment. If you do something unwisely, the thing you did was a bad choice — not because you were unlucky, but because a person thinking carefully would have seen the problem first. "He unwisely told his boss what he really thought." "She spent the money unwisely." It is the opposite of `wisely`, and it is softer and more polite than saying someone was stupid. When a teacher, a judge, or a newspaper says someone acted unwisely, they mean "that was a mistake, and you should have known better" — but they are saying it in a calm, adult way. That politeness is exactly why it feels a bit formal. Friends talking do not usually say "you unwisely bought that phone"; they say "that was a dumb idea." You meet `unwisely` in writing, in news, in reports, in careful speech. A useful thing to notice: it very often comes with a hint of "and it went badly." You rarely hear "he unwisely bought the stock, and it made him rich." The word already leans toward a bad ending. One more habit worth seeing — it likes to sit right in front of the verb: "he unwisely agreed," "they unwisely ignored the warning." Putting it at the end ("he agreed unwisely") is possible but sounds heavier and older.