Convoluted: meaning, example and synonyms
Convolutedadj. Extremely complicated and difficult to follow.
Example
The treaty's convoluted language, with clauses nested inside clauses, allowed each signatory to claim it had won the central dispute.
- Part of speech
- adjective
- Synonyms
- complicated, intricate, tangled, labyrinthine
- Antonyms
- simple, straightforward, clear, plain
- Memory tip
- Latin convolvere = "to roll together": ideas twisted into knots.
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Check yourself: Convoluted in context
The film's ______ plot, which jumps among four timelines and a dozen narrators, left many viewers unsure what had actually happened.
Answer: convoluted. Four timelines and a dozen narrators make the plot hard to follow: convoluted. Earnest, innocuous and exemplary wouldn't confuse viewers.
Taxpayers complained that the forms were so ______ that even accountants needed hours to work out which sections applied.
Answer: convoluted. Forms that baffle accountants are overly complicated: convoluted. Superfluous, salient and earnest don't explain why they took hours to decipher.