a period of time following the moment of speaking or writing; time regarded as still to come:
we plan on getting married in the near future
work on the building will be shelved for the foreseeable future•events that will or are likely to happen in time to come:
nobody can predict the future
•the likely prospects for or fate of someone or something in time to come:
MPs will debate the future of the railways
•a prospect of success or happiness:
he’d decided that there was no future in the gang
I began to believe I might have a future as an artist
•Grammar a tense of verbs expressing events that have not yet happened.
2 (futures) contracts for assets (especially commodities or shares) bought at agreed prices but delivered and paid for later. Compare with forward (sense 2 of the noun).adjective
[attributive]at a later time; going or likely to happen or exist:
the needs of future generations