In the article, the purposes of etymological information in a general-purpose dictionary entry are discussed. The research concerns the newly borrowed vocabulary of the contemporary Russian language. In their analysis, the authors rely on their experience in working on the Dictionary of the Russian Language of the 21st Century project (Dictionary) led by G.N. Sklyarevskaya, and refer to its working materials. The Dictionary aims at describing the contemporary Russian language in its ultimate richness and variety. Its scope thus includes a great number of recent borrowings, both special terms and words in general use. The core of this category of words is formed by (but not confined to) the terms of sciences actively developing nowadays, the vocabulary of various professional groups as well as neologisms designating the newest notions and objects of everyday life (e.g., apdeyt ‘update’, implant ‘implant’, kollayder ‘collider’, autsorsing ‘outsourcing’, vebinar ‘webinar’, bloger ‘blogger’, khard-rok ‘hard-rock’