it has different meanings: 1. used to emphasize what you are saying, like: He missed that kick literally by miles. 2. having the real or original meaning of a word or phrase. like: They were responsible for literally millions of deaths. 3. simply or just. like: Then you literally cut the sausage down the middle.

When used correctly, it means that something is really true--not an exaggeration. So if you say, "That film literally gave me nightmares," it means you actually had nightmares about the movie after you saw it. But you can't say, for example, "I literally died laughing when I heard that joke," because you can't speak after you literally die!

It means - this is true without any exaggeration.

It is overused and at the present time is used to mean two different things. Some people use it to mean 'no exaggeration' and some to mean 'with exaggeration'. Therefore it should be avoided.

Literally...the word literally is never used the proper way amongst native speakers. What is typically meant to be used is the word "figuratively", which is meant as in a figurative sense as in the example above, the proper way is "Figuratively speaking, I died laughing when I heard that joke." This is an adjective to express how extreme something was. Now is you really did die while laughing, someone would say about you, "She literally died laughing when she heard that joke."